When enemies become friends
by MeEksiNs
Summary: A Sakuragi & Rukawa fic . They make a formidable COMBO. You don't believe me? Read for yourself. COMPLETE. Story is focused mainly on Kanagawa Vs Akita. Follows after the 6 volumes of SD manga i.e. Shohoku Vs Sannoh .
1. CHAPTER 01: Learning a 3 pointer shoot

Hi, fellow readers!   
  
It's me again.   
Please remember that I did not create SLAM DUNK. Thank you.  
  
1: Learning a 3 pointer shot  
  
  
Sakuragi was up again by the time the clock hit six in the morning when everyone was still sleeping. It was perhaps already a routine for him; as he stretch himself out like a cat in his small narrow single bed, that creaked under his weight and of which did not accommodate much of his long frame, unbelievably quiet as he walked his way to the toilet where he cleaned himself and changed into his favorite white T-shirt that Haruko had given him not some time ago and into his blue shorts for as long as five minutes before he went out of the room quietly (still unbelievably so) as not to disturb his roommate friends namely Kyota Nobunaga, a.k.a. wild monkey his Kainan freshman rival, Sendoh Akira one of his Ryonan rivals and Rukawa Kaede a.k.a. stupid fox as of course his destined rival as a Shohoku teammate. However, there is a break to this pattern as the latter unintentionally had witnessed all of this scene with a slight curiosity in his eyes but at the same time felt that he did not care what the idiot beginner was up to.  
  
A minute later, he was up and out of the room himself.  
  
***  
  
It had been a week already since he had started his self practice on how to train himself to make a successful 3 pointer shot but all of those days of practice didn't help him with anything at all. In fact he was certain that he had never made even one single successful 3 pointer shot in all of those 7 days. He knew that he was wasting his time learning a shot that he hadn't got a clue how to do but he was too proud of himself to ask anyone to help him with it. After all, he was a genius and a genius does *not* need any help from anyone.   
Although he had to admit that he had asked Jin, another one of the five Kainan players who was an excellent 3 pointer shooter, casually of course how he makes the shot so easily. Jin had at first looked surprised at the unexpected question but he did answer his question.  
  
"Oh, it's easy", Jin had answered with that smile of his. "At least once you got the hang of it. First you've got to have determination and believe in yourself that you can make the shot before you start anything else. If you don't have that, I'm afraid you'll never make even one successful shot. Unless, of course, you've got a talent like Mitsui-san.  
  
"A 3 pointer shot is very similar to a jump shot. You know the steps to a jump shot right? The only difference between the two shots is that a 3 pointer is much farther away from the net. All you have to do to make a successful 3 pointer, is to look straight at the net careful of your opponent defending you and apply as much force and energy to the ball but remember to relax at all time since tension would not help you with anything. Then make a high arc similar to that of how you do to make a jump shot. And oh yeah, another important thing about it is that you don't depend on the strength you apply to the ball. All you have to do is to use your wrist and practice all the time. That's very important".  
  
  
  
  
  
Jin had also been kind enough to demonstrate to him how the shot was made.  
  
The way he had done it, it had looked simple enough and Sakuragi had told him that but Jin just laughed and said, "Yes it does, doesn't it? Until you try it yourself".  
  
At that time, Sakuragi didn't understand what he was talking about since he was talking to a genius who had made a successful 3 pointer shot, though however lucky it was, himself to save the day but now he understood. But he would never admit it to anyone much less to Jin.  
  
However, Jin was not the only one of whom he had asked. Mitsui and ,of course, Anzai Sensei had been the two other people whom he had asked the same question as he had asked Jin.  
  
Mitsui's answer had been much less the same as Jin's except the fact that he had bragged on and on first before he did any explanation about his talent on it to Sakuragi's annoyance. His sensei on the other hand had at first looked surprised then amused then pleased, to Sakuragi's puzzlement, before he answered.  
  
"Ne, Sakuragi-kun. I am afraid that in order for you to learn the 3 pointer shot you have to master all of the shots you have learnt first.  
  
"After you are sure and confident that you have mastered them well enough see how you can master a 3 pointer through using the similar techniques of all the shots that you have learnt and mastered. You shall see that every shot that you make there is a similar technique to it".  
  
In other words, the sensei was of less much help than the others since Sakuragi did not understand what the heck he was talking about. His sensei had also advised him, if he wanted, to practice just about 40 000 shots of them before their next match who was the toughest yet for the next two weeks.  
  
'40 000 shots', eh? thought Sakuragi as he stared at the ball between his hands and gritted his teeth in frustration. 'I haven't even managed to make even one successful shot in 7 days' he thought in annoyance as he let the ball fall down to the ground and dribble it.  
  
He stared at the net which was directly in front of him from behind the 3 pointer line and thought back not for the first time how he had made that unbelievably lucky 'tensai' ( as he calls it) and desperate 3 pointer shot.   
  
He stopped dribbling and caught the ball in his hands. He then closed his eyes before taking a deep breathe and replayed back the scene in his mind.  
  
~Flashback~  
  
He was glancing at the scoreboard and to his great shock and growing panic saw that they did not have enough time.  
  
Their score was 88 (Aichi) to 86 (Kanagawa).  
  
And the time was 5 seconds to the end of the second half.  
  
And they were going to lose.  
  
It was written all over his teammates' faces.  
  
He did not like it.  
  
Sure the time was pretty short he had yelled at them in an unbelievably calm tone and he had added that they also still had time and it was their turn to attack.  
  
However, that time no one answered him. There was only silence bouncing back at him. Even the other players who were on the bench including the wild monkey were pretty quiet.  
  
Their unusual silence only made him more frantic and something else bubbling inside of him; a sense of growing anger and helplessness mixed together. He had not like the feeling. Not at all. But unexpectedly enough though despite all that he felt the strong stubborn determination in him, the feeling that often rises in him in situations similar to this one. It was a rebellious feeling, one of the reasons why he had survived physically and emotionally all of these years leaving alone with an unknown drunk distant relative since he had lost both of his parents and survive through gang fights which always seemed to worm its way to him.  
  
They were going to lose and that was a clear fact.   
  
The fact that they were going to lose made him smile.  
  
In fact he wanted to laugh.  
  
In situations like this, a tensai was called for.  
  
The only tensai around was him and that was more than enough.  
  
They were going to win or his name was not tensai Sakuargi Hanamichi a.k.a. future MVP and the overall king of rebounds.  
  
Without even him knowing it, a plan had already formed in his mind and his body was tensed and ready for action.  
  
'5 seconds be damned' he had thought with a small smile.  
  
Maki was being guarded by Moroboshi, the Star of Aichi, on his right, sweating and tensing like hell. Sendoh was on his left and was being guarded by Gono, a damn excellent player who might as well have been a clone of Sendoh himself in terms of his playing skills and techniques, and was having a hard time matching up with him. Fujima was not far away from him to his right. He had the ball, playing as a point guard this time, but he was guarded by the tall jerk, Hiroshi, who should have been born as a tree trunk than a bulldozer of a player and there was no way he could pass the ball anywhere much less make a 3 pointer shot over head. The tall guy was like a tower next to Fujima's short frame. Rukawa was somewhere slightly to his left and he was being guarded by a senior, Shien, a tough guy who was made like an American football player rather than a basketball player but he was a head taller than Rukawa and played the game as if he had been the one who had invented it. Sakuragi on the other hand was guarded by the shortest player of the team which is to say about the same height as his other teammate Miyagi Ryota. His guard, Hibiki, might be short but he was one hell of a player especially when it comes to playing defense. In other words looking at the situation and things as it were around him, there was ZERO chance for them to even make a move much less make a shot to win the game.  
  
5 seconds was about to run out...  
  
and then...  
  
  
  
  
  
Rukawa was the first one to notice it.  
  
His eyes widened in surprise much to his guard's confusion.  
  
Sakuragi had somehow eluded Hibiki in a blink of an eye while the guard was slightly distracted with reading Fujima's move. What was more surprising was the fact that Hibiki did not seem to notice Sakuragi's disappearance. At least not until he was beside Fujima and was stealing the ball right from his hands.  
  
"What the ...", said Hibiki momentarily surprised but rushed to Sakuragi in a matter of seconds.  
  
From those 3 seconds that was left on the clock, chaos erupted from both teams.  
  
"Oi, Sakuragi. What are you doing?!", said Fujima while he tried to get away from Hiroshi who was blocking his way.  
  
"Sakuragi!", Maki had yelled and waving at him like what and tried to rush to him but Moroboshi was holding him back.  
  
"Sakuragi! Give the ball to Rukawa!", said Sendoh waving his arm towards Rukawa over Gono who was holding him back like a vicious bull dog.  
  
But Rukawa, on the other hand, did not make any move for Sakuargi. In fact, he did not do much of anything except stare at him.  
  
Sakuragi had remembered vaguely that he wondered what the heck he was staring at but he ignored it and automatically ignored Sendoh's order.  
  
Sakuragi was barely aware of his surroundings, of the shouts and yells of his team mates, as he stepped behind a line which he was not aware of but at the same time unconsiously was. He raised his eyes to look at his target, the net, which seemed so far away and raised his arms in a high arc. Almost in a blur, with deadening calm, he let the ball fly away from his hands.  
  
2 seconds..  
  
Everyone stared at the ball which was flying high overhead them. It was so high that they wondered how the hell that was possible.   
  
1 second..  
  
The ball was falling.. falling so fast that it was a blur and looked like a meteorite about to crash on earth.  
  
It also looked like it had no chance of getting through the net.  
  
And everyone knew it.  
  
There was also the fact that the shooter was Sakuragi and everyone knew that he had never attempt a 3 pointer shot before much less learn it. It would take a miracle for the shot to go through.  
  
Even before anything happened, Rukawa was the first one to be shocked because...  
  
Zero second later..  
  
  
  
  
  
A miracle did happen.   
  
The ball *had* swished through the net.  
  
Right before the whistle that marked the end of the game was blown.   
  
He had done it.  
  
The official score was 88 (Aichi) to 89 (Kanagawa).  
  
The idiot had actually done it.  
  
Silence of shock and disbelief had waved through the Aichi indoor basketball stadium like an incoming Tsunami.   
  
Then...  
  
Kyota Nobunaga had broke it.  
  
"WHAT THE *HELL*!", he had shouted running towards Sakuragi as if he wanted so badly to murder him but at the same time worship him like a god. However, he settled on punching an equally shocked Sakuragi like a punching bag instead and yelling, "You jack ass! You piece of idiot! You red-haired monkey! You *did* it! I just can NOT believe it!".  
  
After that he did not remember much of anything that had happened. All he had remembered was that he was momentarily numb with shock of what he had done and a too familiar pale face who had slightly smiled back at him.   
  
Now who could that person be?   
  
~end of flashback~   
  
Without him knowing it while he was replaying back the play in his mind, he had unconsciously followed the feeling and steps of when he had made the shot. Only when had opened his eyes did he realize that the ball which had been in his hands a few minutes ago was now high up in the air and as a second later had swished smoothly like a dream through the net.  
  
It was only when the ball hit the ground did he snapped back from his momentary state of shock at his second success of shooting a 3 pointer.  
  
A second later he was bouncing up and down and yelling in exultance.  
  
***  
  
It was not unusual for Rukawa to be up and about so early in the morning as he too was one of the players, aside Maki, Fujima and Akagi, to do some early self practice before the actual practicing itself with the rest of the team.  
  
But what was unusual, at least in Rukawa's mind or that he simply had just noticed, was the fact that when he had come downstairs from his shared quarters, with a basketball spinning around on his forefinger he saw Anzai Sensei drinking a nice steamy coffee in the TV hall. He also had a towel wrapped around his neck, wore a morning exercise sports shirt and was reading the daily newspaper while the TV in front of him was on.  
  
For a minute there, Rukawa blinked at the sight of his sensei sitting there and stopped in his tracks while the ball on his finger was still spinning.  
  
"Anzai Sensei?", said Rukawa as if to make sure that it was his sensei that he was seeing.  
  
At the sound of his voice, Anzai Sensei looked up from his newspaper, saw Rukawa at the bottom of the stairs and smiled.   
  
"Oh, it's you Rukawa-kun. Ohayo gozaimasu", greeted Anzai Sensei pleasantly. He motioned him over. "Come have some coffee".  
  
"Ohayo gozaimasu", murmured Rukawa in return as he went over to his sensei, his ball tucked under one arm.  
  
As Rukawa sat down adjacent to his sensei, Anzai sensei poured him a cup of coffee.  
  
"Help yourself, Rukawa-kun", his sensei said gesturing to the fresh rolls and pancakes which was spread on the table before them.  
  
"Hai. Arrigato gozaimasu", murmured Rukawa, as he sipped his hot coffee and helped himself with a piece of pancake.  
  
His sensei then resumed back to reading the newspaper while Rukawa ate and watched a little bit of the morning news from the TV.  
  
Just as Rukawa was about to leave the table for his early morning practice, his sensei suddenly put down his paper, folded it in half and put it aside. He leaned forward, picked up a tea spoon and slowly stirred his coffee.  
  
Sensing that his sensei wanted to say something, Rukawa decided to remain seated and patiently waited for his sensei to speak up.  
  
"Rukawa-kun", said his sensei, looking up at Rukawa with his always pleasant grandfatherly like smile. "What do you think of Sakuragi's shot in the last match that we've had?".  
  
The question, which was so unexpected, had caught him by surprise and had left him looking blank and taken aback although his face remained coolly expressionless.  
  
"Sakuragi?", he murmured. "What about him?".  
  
He chuckled. "I am thinking of the rapid progress that boy is going. The last shot that he had made, which had taken me by complete surprise, had yet proven my theory about him".   
  
/Theory? What is the sensei talking about?/ thought Rukawa, frowning slightly.  
  
"Theory, sensei?", asked Rukawa looking a slightly puzzled.  
  
"Ah", the sensei said, nodding. He bit into a sliced roll before continuing, "A small one but nothing significant, I'm afraid".  
  
His sensei then drank down his coffee while Rukawa waited patiently for him to continue.  
  
But he did not really continue. All he said was before Rukawa left.  
  
  
"Ah, Rukawa-kun. Before you go can you do me a favor and check the outdoor basketball court up front? Make sure that there is no one occupying it since the coaches and I had decided just yesterday that we'll have our practice outdoors rather than indoors today for a change. A little bit of fresh air never hurts anyone".  
  
***  
  
On his way to the outdoor basketball court which was not far away from the apartment where they were living, he wondered again over the conversation he had had with his sensei not five minutes ago.  
  
"What do you think about Sakuragi, Rukawa-kun?", Anzai sensei had said. Well, at least it was something similar to that.  
  
"What about him?", Rukawa muttered as he spun the basketball that he had brought with him on his forefinger.  
  
Actually, Anzai Sensei had also asked him that similar question not long ago when he had for the first time went to his sensei's house to tell him of his plans of going to the U.S. to further his experience in playing the basketball sport.  
  
The answer to that question had also been the same answer as he had answered his sensei a few minutes ago.  
"What about him?".  
  
Right then like it had been five minutes ago, his answer only brought a chuckle out of his sensei.  
  
Rukawa thought back again of what his sensei's real question was five minutes ago.  
  
/The idiot's 3 pointer shot?../ he thought with a frown. /I don't think anything much of it. Anyone could do it. *I* can do it even better than he does./  
  
But then he really thought about his sensei's question and wondered what the real question was behind it.  
  
Come to think of it, he replayed back the scene of Sakuragi's shot in his mind. He remembered staring at the idiot thinking that he was finally going nuts what with him taking the desperate situation into his own hands and risking a shot that he had never attempt much less learnt before but at the same time seeing the complete calm and control of himself and the execution of the shot that he had made there had been absolutely no doubt in his mind that he'd make one clean beautiful shot. And it did too. He had to admit. That had shocked him for a good full minute that time but then again he should not have been surprised since the idiot seems to have all the luck in the world. To be exact, all the beginners' luck in the world.  
  
When he was near the outdoor basketball court, Rukawa slowed down his walk but then frowned when he caught the sound of a familiar 'thumping' of something hitting against the ground.  
  
It seemed like a ball was being dribbled and apparently someone was occupying the court.  
  
Since he had done the favor that his sensei had asked him, Rukawa turned around and was about to leave the area when he heard a familiar voice cursing a loud foul curse under his breathe.  
  
Founding himself a little bit puzzled and curious, Rukawa decided to investigate the owner of the voice.  
  
When he did, he was not surprised to find the owner of the voice being the *idiot* Sakuragi but what did make him surprised and slightly amused was the fact that it seemed to him that Sakuragi was trying to make some kind of shot.  
  
Boink!, went off the first shot against the board.  
  
Boink!, came another shot that went right off the board.  
  
It went on and on like that for 10 times with all of them executed in a series of lousy and clumsy shots.   
  
The scene was also making Rukawa bored out of his wits. Apparently, the idiot needed to learn the basics of how to make whatever shot he was making before he actually did the intended shot. Of course, Rukawa had no intention of helping him with that though. Rukawa had bigger fish to fry and become the best player the country had ever seen yet. But first he had to beat that Sannoh player, Sawakita, first since he was and is still the number one high school player in the country even though the Shohoku team had beaten them by a hair not three months ago in the interhigh games.   
  
Rukawa was about to turn and head back for the indoor basketball court that they usually use for practice when something caught his attention.  
  
Sakuragi had now closed his eyes and seemed to be concentrating on something. When he raised his arms high in an arc, Rukawa realized with a sudden burst of flashback that the red head was doing the same thing again as he did before he had made the last shot that had saved their team.  
  
He knew like before even before the ball was flying up in the air towards the net that, the 3 pointer shot was perfectly executed and there no way he was going to miss. And it did not. The shot was perfect.  
  
Rukawa did not believe it. For the second time he did not believe it.   
  
The idiot had actually made it.  
  
He did not even have his eyes opened at that time.  
  
It was when Rukawa had left leaving Sakuragi yelling, not so strangely, like anything at the success of his shot did he remember another thing that Anzai Sensei had once said.  
  
"Ho, ho, ho. The two might never learn to co-operate with each other but they are the best young players I have ever seen in quite a while. There is no doubt in my mind that they will take the country by storm".   
  
###  
  
Please, let me know how this chapter is to you.   
  
Thanks for review! 


	2. CHAPTER 02: A Vs B & C Vs D

Disclaimer: SLAM DUNK is not created by moi much less owning it. ^^   
  
Author's Note: This chapter is my favorite part of the fic.  
  
Checked and editted by shiyuchiyuki.  
  
Wanna say anything about my fic just e-mail me: yuki_ne@hotmail.com  
  
Thanks ^^  
  
02: Group A Vs Group B & Group C Vs Group D  
  
Three days later..  
  
It was in the afternoon, and the Kanagawa basketball team representatives were having their usual training practice session. The three coaches, Taoka sensei from Ryonan, Takato sensei from Kainan and Anzai sensei from Shohoku had divided each of their team members equally into four separate teams. In these four teams, members from different teams of Shohoku, Ryonan, Kainan and Shoyo were mixed together to become one entirely different group of members.   
  
Group A, their members were Maki, Hanagata, Fukuda, Ikegami and Mitsui.  
  
Group B, their members were Fujima, Akagi, Hasegawa, Koshino and Jin.  
  
Group C, their members were Miyagi, Takesago (Kainan), Rukawa, Takano (Shoyo) and Nagano (Shoyo).  
  
Group D, their members were Sendoh, Uozumi, Miyamasu (Kainan), Sakuragi and Kyota Nobunaga.   
  
Group A were to have a match with B while Group C were to have a match with D.  
  
By the time the training practice ended, everyone collapsed from exhaustion and dehydration of sweat but it had been a satisfying game between the four teams. At least that was their coaches' opinion.  
  
To describe the practice in short, it had been one hell of a bloody war.  
  
***   
  
The time was five minutes till the end of the game.  
  
The score was 54 (A) to 54 (B).  
  
And neither teams were bulging from their places.  
  
The point getters from each teams namely Maki and Fujima were locking horns with each other, with Fujima trying to break the barrier in front of him but Maki refusing to be broken.  
  
Akagi was under the net guarded by Hanagata who matched his towering height. He was trying to catch Fujima's eye telling him that he was ready to make a shot if he was ready.  
  
Hasegawa and Koshino could not do much of anything to assist them since they were being closely guarded by either Mitsui or Ikegami.   
  
Jin, on the other hand, could be marked as free; Fujima mentally noted as he glanced unconspiciously around him, since Fukuda was still pretty weak in defense.  
  
Fujima noted the time.  
  
It was ten seconds to the 30 seconds violation. He had to make a move fast.  
  
Tensing a bit and looking at Maki straight in the eye with eyes clearly exposing nothing of what he had in mind, he forced his way through Maki almost making a foul but then spun around to his right. However, Maki intercepted him there but that was no problem since that was only a feint move so that he could back pass the ball right through him to his left at Akagi.  
  
Surprised at the move but not shaken, Maki did not waste any time coming after Akagi, who had the ball, to help Hanagata block his shot under the basket. Akagi rose his arms in the air intending to make the shot. Both Hanagata and Maki fell straight for his move, blocking his view of the net.  
  
But Akagi had something else in mind. Apparently, he had read Fujima's mind because a second later while both Hanagata and Maki was still high up in the air intending to block his shot, Akagi had passed that ball to an awaiting Fujima.  
  
However, the ball did not get into Fujima's possession. Somehow, throughout the confusion Mitsui had appeared in between Akagi and Fujima, cutting right through them and stole away the ball giving Fujima no chance of intercepting it.  
  
"Yosh!", yelled Mitsui in triumph as he was about to make a turn and yell for a fast break but no longer than a few seconds that the ball was in his hands, Hasegawa had slapped the ball away from him, incredibly without the whistle being blown.  
  
Now, the ball was not in anyone's grasp. It was still bouncing off on its own and in danger of falling out of the line.  
  
"The ball's still alive! Somebody catch it!", yelled Fujima who was himself running after the ball.  
  
"Five seconds to go! Don't let them get the ball!", yelled Maki who was running neck to neck beside Fujima.  
  
Four heads dived towards the ball which was about to fall out of line..  
  
Maki, Fujima, Koshino and Fukuda practically bumped their heads together as they tried to scramble after the ball. Four hands tried to grasp it but it kept slipping down towards the ground.  
  
But then..  
  
Fukuda managed to get a hold of it. Holding it with one hand as if his life depended on it, he whammed the ball like a bat hitting a baseball into the court to no one in particular.  
  
Ikegami lunged for it but he was too late. Jin had somehow got the ball first before he did. Stepping behind the 3 pointer line, he executed his fatal 3 pointer shot.  
  
He could have made the shot if Hanagata weren't suddenly in front of him and had somehow touched the ball which had already been executed in the air with the tip of his fingers and interrupted its aiming balance for the net.  
  
A second later, the ball rebounded off at the same time with the 30 seconds were up.  
  
"All right! Nice play boys and keep it up. Less than 4 minutes to go till the end of the game so show some action! Where's the result, eh?", said Taoka sensei from the sidelines.  
  
Takato sensei, who was beside the other sensei, was waving his favorite fan in front of his face, said, "The group who wins this game will be marked as the best team!".  
  
'No action, huh?', thought Mitsui with some irritation as he wiped his sweat from his forehead and huffed and puffed, like the desperate wolf of the 3 pigs, from exhaustion. 'The old man must be blind'.  
  
'What tough guys', thought Fukuda as he glanced around at Akagi and Hanagata who were sizing up each other, Koshino and Hasegawa nearly dead, Jin who looked dazed, Ikegami who looked like he could use a tank of water to drink and Maki and Fujima who were both glaring at each other like a couple of bulldogs fighting over the same bone.  
  
'The best team, huh? Sounds great', thought Maki with a small smile of determination hanging at the edge of his lips.  
  
'Not if I beat you first, you won't', thought Fujima, as if he had read Maki's mind, with an equally grim determination.  
  
And that was how the next four minutes went. Long and stubborn with neither of the teams bulging from their places.  
  
***  
  
The time was also five minutes till the end of the game.  
  
The only difference was the score between both teams.  
  
Group C had scored 80 while Group D had only scored 60.  
  
In other words, Group D was way, way behind by 20 points.  
  
It was of course thanks to both Sakuragi and Kyota.  
  
Two born sarus.  
  
Stubborn idiotic sarus.  
  
Not for the first time, Uozumi banged both sarus on the head.  
  
WHAM!  
  
It sounded like a jackhammer crash landing flat onto a solid concrete ground.  
  
But it had absolutely no effect whatsoever on them since both of them were still wringing each other's neck trying to murder one another for completely no reason at all. At least Uozumi did not think there was any logical reason at all.   
  
"For once, can both of you stop and think to co-operate with each other and play in the game with us?!", roared Uozumi, also not for the first time.  
  
All the other members jumped at the roar but not the two of them. They were simply too deep into their nonsense argument.   
  
All the while throughout the game, Sendoh had looked amused though he did look a little bit exasperated for both of them.  
  
"It seems to me that the only people who could control these two are their own captains, Akagi-san and Maki-san", Sendoh drawled as he dribbled the ball which was in their possession under his hand.  
  
Miyagi who looked more than irritated and exasperated yelled at Sakuragi. "Oi, Hanamichi! What the heck are you doing? You're suppose to be back on offense, you baka!".  
  
He might as well have been talking into thin air since Sakuragi was ignoring him altogether.  
  
Both Takano and Nagano just shook their heads as if they were wondering how the heck they had ended up having a pair of idiots as opponents. Takesago looked a little bit dazed and lost. Miyamasu, on the other hand, looked like he wanted out. Period. Apparently, he was suffering from the same headache as Takesago.  
  
"Oi, No saru! How the heck do you suppose I get the rebounds, eh? What with you jumping up around like the no saru you are and blocking my way!", yelled Sakuragi angrily, his hands clutching Kyota's front T-shirt in a tight choke hold.  
  
"What the hell are you talking about, Akage saru?", yelled back Kyota in outrage. "What rebound are you talking about?! Just because every time the ball bounces off the ring doesn't mean that I would go for the rebound, you baka! I was going to dunk it! You forever baka!".  
  
***  
  
A vein popped out off Taoka sensei's forehead at the idiotic display in front of him while Takato sensei (Kainan) had a huge sweat drop running down his forehead.  
  
The Kainan coach sighed. "Yare, Yare. Who had matched them to be in the same team together in the first place anyway?".  
  
Anzai sensei ,who sat beside him and who had a cup of hot herbal tea in his hands, just chuckled at that. "Ho, ho, ho".  
  
***  
  
"Can nobody stop them?", growled Uozumi, barely able to restrain his desire in murdering them right then and there.  
  
Sendoh just grinned and shrugged back at him but he was eyeing a certain guy to his right who looked like he might be the only one who could finally shut both of them up.  
  
He wondered why he didn't do it earlier.  
  
"Oi", said a soft chilling voice suddenly behind both sarus.  
  
Instantly, as if on automatic they both turned towards the voice, to everyone's surprise except Sendoh who was still grinning in amusement.  
  
"Will both of you two do'ahos shut up", said Rukawa with an underlying tone of chilling menace in his soft voice.  
  
It certainly was not a question.   
  
Their reactions were spontaneous.  
  
Both of them were, without saying, outraged.  
  
"What did you just say, Rukawa?!", yelled Kyota in outrage advancing on him as if he was the prey.  
  
"Temme, Kitsune! Who told you to boss us around?!", yelled Sakuragi equally outraged and who were also advancing on Rukawa like Kyota.   
  
Rukawa who was unpeturbed by their menacing advance just sighed, shrugged and shook his head.  
  
"Whatever. After all both of you can *never* beat me", said Rukawa saying it as if stating it as a fact which was really the truth actually before he turned and walked away.  
  
It was only a full minute later, did either of them react to his last departing words.   
  
"NANI?!", yelled the both of them.  
  
"Sendoh! Give that ball to me! I'll show that kitsune just how great I am next to him!", yelled Sakuragi rushing towards Sendoh.  
  
"Oi Sakuragi!, make sure you get that shot or else I'll kill you! I just can *NOT* stand that bakayarou's arrogance. I'll catch the rebound and dunk it if you miss it", said Kyota rushing to his position.  
  
"Who are you kidding, No saru", said Sakuragi as he caught the ball thrown by Sendoh at him and going for the net at top speed. "I'll never miss it!".  
  
"Just shut up and shoot it. Damn it!", yelled Kyota.  
  
Sendoh jogged up beside Rukawa while the others defended those two sarus and drawled, "Why didn't you do that earlier, I wonder".  
  
At first, Rukawa did not say anything but then he muttered, "What are you talking about".  
  
Sendoh grinned. "You know I'm no fool, Rukawa. You could have stopped their nonsense earlier and save us some nice game. So why didn't you?".  
  
Again he didn't directly answer him but then said finally, "No business of yours. 20 points behind is pretty big, isn't it?".  
  
Sendoh's grin widened as he understood what he was talking about then laughed.  
  
"You did that on purpose so that your group can win the game, huh?".  
  
Rukawa shrugged.  
  
Sendoh laughed. "Then what changed your mind and stopped their nonsense?".  
  
Again Rukawa shrugged.   
  
Sendoh grinned. "I'll get the points back. So don't worry about it".  
  
Rukawa slightly raised one jet black eyebrow. He glanced at the score leaf sheet and noted the time. "You've got less than four minutes to do that".  
  
"Like I said. Don't worry. Besides, we've got Sakuragi and Kyota back on our side".  
  
***  
  
In the end, it turned out that both of the first two groups were the best team since their score was a tie.  
  
Group A scoring 62 and Group B scoring 62.  
  
On the other hand...  
  
"You were saying?", said Rukawa to Sendoh when the whistle that signaled the end of the second half was blown.  
  
With a sheepish grin and a shrug, Sendoh said, "So ok. We didn't win but we did catch up on you didn't we?".  
  
The score was 85 (C) to 79 (D).  
  
"I'd say both of them did a great job in the end", commented Sendoh nodding towards Sakuragi and Kyota who had resumed to their bickering nonsense.  
  
Rukawa just shrugged while watching both of them get banged up on the head by their seperate captains.  
  
"Both of them will need to improve if we are to win against the next match we're going to face", said Rukawa.  
  
"Ah", agreed Sendoh then shook his head. He then grinned. "Especially Sakuragi".  
  
Rukawa frowned at that but understood what he was saying.  
  
There was no denying that Sakuragi may prove to be a valuable player in the next game like he had been in the last one that they had.  
  
With Sakuragi, one could never tell what he has got in his mind.   
  
###END OF CHAPTER###  
  
Simply my fave chapter ^_^. Anyways, reviews on this chapter is greatly appreciated! 


	3. CHAPTER 03: Friends & Rivals

Hi, guys. I'm back!  
  
Disclaimer: In case you forget, I did not create Slam Dunk. Thank you. However, the 'combined team' was my idea.  
  
Author's Note: Thanks for all your reviews! ^_^.   
  
03: Friends and Rivals  
  
That night..  
  
Outside, the rain was pouring down heavily making the rafters bang around loudly but the people inside the apartment that they stayed in were not disturbed by it. Anyway, by then they were already sleeping peacefully and soundly rather exhausted from the day's tough workout.  
  
That is except for two certain individuals.  
  
###  
  
It was already becoming a habit for Sakuragi to have a work out for himself late in the night. Usually he'd prefer practicing at the outdoor basketball court since that's the place where the others would not get to catch the genius practicing if they happened to pass by the indoor court or practice themselves in there if he were to take all his practices in the indoor court. But tonight it did not seem like he had any other choice but to take his practices inside. But then again with all the others already sound asleep and the rain pouring like a typhoon was in the process of blowing them all the away, he did not think that anybody would hear him anyway so he was safe and he had the night all to himself.  
  
He did not want the others to know that he was practicing and training himself in secret. In other words, he wanted to surprise every one of them and just show them what a real genius can do. Besides, he wanted to beat the hell out of Rukawa. The guy just pisses him off. It seems like he got all the glory and fame and the luck. Not just that, but he also gets to have Haruoko-san's attention.  
  
"Kuso", he cursed viciously at that reminder making him even more determined than ever to get through all the 40 000 shots that his sensei had advised him to do.  
  
But he had a long way to go.  
  
1 out of 40 000 shots is certainly no where near enough.  
  
###  
  
As usual, Rukawa was training himself to the extreme with his mind full of all the strongest rivals he had ever faced in his basketball life.  
  
First, there was Maki. Even though, he was a teammate at least for now and they were on good terms with each other like he was with almost the rest of the team, he still considered him as his arch rival though lately he had beaten him in a one on one match three or four times already.  
  
Then there were Fujima and Sendoh. Another two of his current teammates. He had to admit, Fujima was as strong as Maki but understood why he could never beat Maki. It was simply because, even though his skills and techniques were fantastic and impressive, Fujima was predictable. At least, in the eyes of another ace. In some one on one match he had with him, he also had won about the same number times as he did with Maki. Sendoh, on the other hand, was a whole different topic altogether. It was true what people said about him being on the same level with Maki but the guy was as tough as nails compared to him (Maki) despite his carefree and sunny attitude. At least that's his opinion. Out of four one on one match with him, they were equal. Sendoh was either improving or he was catching up with him.   
  
Then there's that game that was coming up in the next two weeks. The game between their team and the Akita Shoten prefecture team. The game that, in his and everyone's opinion, will be the toughest of the lot. This was because among the four teams that represented the prefecture, Sannoh, the 33 years running champion until about three months ago when they were beaten for the first time by Shohoku, was one of them.  
  
Besides that fact, he was finally going to have another match with one of the players who was still marked as the best player in the nation. A match that will finally declare who was the best player in the nation. He did not give a damn if it was a personal or public match. He just wanted to settle the score once and for all.  
  
He knew that without a doubt Sawakita, the best player, would want to settle the match as much as he did.  
  
After all, Sawakita was almost a carbon copy of himself.  
  
At least in terms of skills, techniques and calculated calmness and determination.  
  
***  
  
Sakuragi was getting nowhere with his shots. Sure, his jump shots, lay-up shots, under the basket shots and his dunk shots went perfectly well but how the hell can one describe 3 pointer shots that either bounces off the ring or bounces off the board or did not even touch the ring of the net at all?  
  
He still had 39 000 shots to go.  
  
And it had already been three hours since he had started.  
  
"Kuso!", cursed Sakuragi, slamming the ball, which he had been crushing in his hands, to the ground.   
  
The ball bounced off to a tall height from its forceful impact and proceeded to bounce off on its own and well away from Sakuragi.  
  
The echoes of the ball dribbling away filled the quiet hall with the background sound being all the rain outside which was still pouring but not so heavily then.  
  
Sakuragi slumped towards the court's floor. No, he was not defeated. No. He was far away from it.   
  
He stared at the receding ball which was now rolling away to the far end of the hall. The ball had now stopped rolling and was quietly sitting at the corner, almost covered by the shadow it provided.   
  
He still stared at the ball but he did not see it. What he saw was the terrible shots that he had executed not hours ago and thought what the hell was the matter with all of his attempted shots.  
  
Holding his head in his hands, he thought it all over again, trying to spot the mistakes he could have done in all of his shots but.. he couldn't spot any. He did not think a genius like himself could make any mistakes anyway. But then, why can't he make the 3 pointer shots?  
  
He then abruptly sat upright.  
  
THUMP THUMP THUMP  
  
He cranked his neck to his right and looked hard at the closed opaque sliding door which lead to the other indoor court with a frown.  
  
THUMP THUMP THUMP  
  
There it was again. The sound of a ball being dribbled away. Apparently, someone was next door and using the court.  
  
It seems that he was not the only one who was practicing that night.  
  
Curious, he stood up and went to the door.  
  
'Now, who could that be at this hour?', Sakuragi thought as he glanced at the wall clock that showed that it was already one o'clock in the morning.  
  
Slowly, he slide the door open.  
  
And just in time saw Rukawa making a dunk shot.   
  
The dunk shot he had made was so powerful that it shook the post. The post was still shaking even after Rukawa had jumped down from the ring after hanging there for a minute to catch hold of his breathe.  
  
At first, Sakuragi was slightly taken aback at the sight of Rukawa being there, also practicing alone by himself but then again he was not really surprised since everyone knew that Rukawa had a habit of having night time practices on his own.   
  
But that did not mean that he was happy to see him there.  
  
Feeling the familiar irritation and sense of rivalry whenever Rukawa was around, he almost automatically yelled a bloody curse at him and give him a punch or two but then he stopped when he saw that Rukawa was running for the 3 pointer shot line.  
  
Almost immediately, without himself knowing it, Sakuragi observed every move Rukawa made to make the shot.   
  
He saw that before he had executed the shot, Rukawa had at first made a jump similar to that of a jump shot. He also saw that his eyes were high and aimed straight for the net, no hesitation, with his arms high in the air in a high arc. When he let the ball fly through the air, Sakuragi saw that he did not so much as use his strength but he did make a forceful push with his right hand, his wrist doing all the job, with his other left hand just steadying the ball and do nothing just like how a jump shot is done. In all of that though, what he noticed the most was that his posture was relaxed and not tensed. Like his sensei always told him that to make any shot, he would have to be relaxed and not in the least bit tensed.  
  
Rukawa's shot went right through the hoop.  
  
Unconsciously, Sakuragi fisted his fist at that.  
  
'Kuso', thought Sakuragi menacingly. 'That baka kitsune'.  
  
He stormed back into the other indoor court where he had been practicing earlier sliding the door shut with a bang though he did not realize it.  
  
Grabbing a nearby ball and dribbling it to the nearest post, he said under his breath determination lining in it, "I'll beat you, Rukawa. You, wait and see".  
  
***  
  
'The idiot never learns how to be quiet', thought Rukawa dryly as he made a middle range jump shot.  
  
The ball went right in.  
  
He knew that the red haired idiot had been in the other court practicing what seems to be more of the 3 pointer shots that he had caught him doing the other day at the outdoor basketball court. By the sound of it though, he wasn't getting much luck with it.   
  
His loud foul curses had confirmed him that much.   
  
He did not realize the idiot had been watching him play, for how long a length of time; he did not know and didn't care to know, until he had banged the sliding the door closed surprising the hell out of him.  
  
"Kuso!", came another curse from Sakuragi in the next court.  
  
Rukawa just sighed and shook his head.   
  
He certainly was not one of his strongest rivals.  
  
At that thought he frowned.  
  
But then again, he had almost matched up with the Sannoh player, Sawakita, in their last winning game of the Inter High games. Also there was the fact that Anzai sensei had sensed that Sakuragi was more than what he seems to be.  
  
Besides, there was the fact that when the idiot had challenged him on a one on one game about four months ago, Rukawa had instinctively used all his energy and skills just to beat the idiot beginner. Till now, he didn't know why he had done that except that that time he had felt a little bit threatened by Sakuragi's bottomless stamina and unpredictable moves.   
  
Just in case what the sensei had said might come true, Rukawa decided not to cross Sakuragi completely out from his list of his possible rivals.  
  
***  
  
An hour later..  
  
"Kuso!", cursed Sakuragi yet again as the ball fell off the ring after it circled around it for the third time. "I almost had it!".  
  
He glowered at the bouncing ball as if it was its fault.  
  
"Why didn't you fall in, you... stupid..?!"  
  
"Che. You talking to a ball, do'aho?", interrupted a familiar cool bored voice suddenly to his right.  
  
Sakuragi immediately stiffened at the sound of the voice. Immediately, he whirled around to face him yelling, "Temme, Rukawa!".  
  
"Urusee, do'aho. People are still sleeping".  
  
But he ignored him. "You bad luck baka! Look what you made that ball do! I almost had it go in!".  
  
A ball suddenly zoomed its way to him hitting it squarely on his face. It was followed by a harsh cool voice.  
  
"I said 'Urusee', do'aho".  
  
"Temme, Rukawa!!!".  
  
Rukawa just sighed and shook his head as he entered the other court lazily with a ball spinning around on one forefinger.  
  
Sakuragi was rubbing his red injured face muttering some curses and looked like he wanted to pound Rukawa to the ground but managed to say without actually starting anything first, "What the heck are you doing here?".  
  
At first Rukawa did not say anything. He just stood there looking as bored and as cool as he always looked with the ball still spinning around on one fore finger to the next. Then he said in that low voice of his, "I got tired of hearing your curses and lousy shots from next door so I decided to see for myself what the hell you were doing".  
  
"NANI?!", said an angry Sakuragi. "Are you trying to pick a fight with me?".  
  
"If I am, you'll be the loser", said Rukawa coolly in return.  
  
"Why you...".  
  
But before Sakuragi could murder him on the spot, Rukawa vanished right in front of him in the blink of an eye.  
  
"Nanda?!..", said a baffled Sakuragi, but then turned around and just in time saw Rukawa making a 3 pointer shot.   
  
A second later, the ball went right through.  
  
Picking up the same ball from beneath the post, Rukawa said, "Were you trying make that shot?".  
  
'How the hell did he know that?', thought Sakuragi slightly but not so much as taken aback.  
  
"What if I was?", Sakuragi challenged.  
  
Rukawa just shrugged, resuming with spinning the ball back on one finger. "Nothing. Thing is you'll never master that shot".  
  
"What did you say, Rukawa?!".  
  
".. unless you have someone to help you".  
  
Sakuragi stopped and stared opened mouth at him.  
  
He blinked then slowly said, "Are you suggesting that you want to help the tensai?..".  
  
Rukawa rolled his eyes slightly and puffed out an exasperated sigh. "What the hell are you talking about, do'aho? I'll never help you in anything".  
  
"Then why are you even talking about this 'helping' stuff that I need? What would you know?", demanded Sakuragi, his eyes narrowing.   
  
Rukawa slightly raised an eyebrow. "I'm one of the best players around, do'aho. Of course I'd know", he said coolly as he went off to the other court.  
  
"Hey, where're you going?", said Sakuragi.  
  
"Sleep", muttered Rukawa under his breath without so much as looking back at him.  
  
"No stamina left, I see", Sakuragi snickered.  
  
"Whatever, do'aho", said Rukawa coolly as he slide the door closed behind him.   
  
Sakuragi snickered all the way and continued making the shots. This time, even though his shots still did not go in, his aiming was getting better and each and every shot he had made almost went right in.  
  
***   
  
After he had washed his sweat off in the locker shower room and changed into his fresh clothes, he was about to call it a night and go upstairs to sleep when for some reason he decided to go back to the indoor court and see how the hell the red head idiot was doing.  
  
When he was back in the indoor court, with Sakuragi oblivious to his presence, he saw that he wasn't doing badly. At least his shots weren't as bad as before. It was still bad but not as messy and clumsy as before.  
  
'The idiot's learning pretty fast', Rukawa thought with a slight frown on his face as he watched Sakuragi making another 3 pointer shot.   
  
It almost went right in except for the fact that the ball didn't seem to want to get into net. In fact, it went around the ring twice before it decided to fall off on its side.  
  
Rukawa had spotted the mistake that he had made.  
  
"KUSO!", cursed Sakuragi yet again.  
  
"You were too tense, do'aho", said Rukawa from the doorway and who were partially covered by the shadows of the corner hall.  
  
Sakuragi jumped almost a meter high at the unexpected voice.  
  
Again, he whirled around. "What the hell are you doing here this time? No wonder the ball didn't go in. You are here. Well?", he demanded angrily.  
  
As if Sakuragi hadn't just said anything, Rukawa said, "You were too tense, do'aho".  
  
"I was what?!".  
  
"You heard me, do'aho", Rukawa said, as he strolled over.  
  
"I was not! A tensai does not tense".  
  
"Whatever", said Rukawa as he picked up a stray ball and dribbled it.   
  
He went behind the 3 pointer line and said, "See this line?". He tapped one of his foot onto the while line on the floor. "That's a 3 pointer line shot".  
  
"Wakatarayou!".  
  
Rukawa ignored his glare.  
  
He jerked his thumb behind him toward the net and said, "And that's a net".  
  
"I know that!".  
  
Rukawa then positioned himself behind the line in a stance to shoot a 3 pointer.   
  
"Watch and learn, do'aho", he said before he executed the shot.  
  
It goes without saying that it went right through the net.  
  
"Piece of cake", said Rukawa the second the ball bounced back to the ground.  
  
Sakuragi's fist unconsciously fisted in irritation.  
  
"If you want to make a successful 3 pointer, figure out how I did that".  
  
With that Rukawa went off.  
  
An hour later, at 3 in the morning, he turned in for the night.   
  
He glanced at the black haired guy who had his head buried under a pillow with his head phones of his disc man over his ear and drooling in his sleep adjacent to where he sleeps.  
  
Sakuragi just shook his head.   
  
He didn't understand the baka kitsune. He had just said that there was no way he'd ever help him out in anything.  
  
That night, after Rukawa left, Sakuragi had managed to score ten 3 pointers.  
  
Only 38 990 shots to go.  
  
He dozed off with a satisfied and triumphant smile on his face.  
  
###END OF CHAPTER###  
  
Oh, man.. To tell you the truth I'm actually disappointed with this chapter. I think it's because it looks almost like I didn't know what the heck I was doing.  
  
Anyway, if you want to say something about this chapter please do so.  
  
If you also think that it's a disappointment please don't hesitate to tell me about it. In fact I'll appreciate it if you do so that I can improve myself even more.  
  
Of course you can also say that it's ok too. :D   
  
Oh, and by the way, GOMEN for my bad English spelling / grammar! I'll also try to improve that!   
  
My e-mail address: shiyuchiyuki@yahoo.com or yuki_ne@hotmail.com 


	4. CHAPTER 04: 40 000 shots

Hi!  
  
Disclaimer: Slam Dunk does not belong to me.  
  
Author's Note: ???  
  
04: 40 000 shots  
  
A week later,  
  
"What the hell happened to that Akage saru?", asked Kyota to no one in particular during one afternoon training practice session.  
  
Sendoh, who was the nearest heard him and said with a shrug and an amused expression said, "I have no idea but you forget to include Rukawa in your question too".  
  
"Yeah, you're right. What the hell did happen to them?", said Mitsui who had also heard the question and was now like, the rest of the team, looking at both players who were at the end of the hall doing some baskets together.  
  
"Maybe, Hanamichi's sick", suggested Miyagi who stood beside Mitsui.  
  
"With him yelling over there and waving his arms around like a chicken without its head, I seriously I doubt that", said Koshino dryly.  
  
"What about Rukawa then? I thought he isn't in cahoots with the Akage saru", said a puzzled Kyota.  
  
Both Mitsui and Miyagi simultaneously frowned at that and said, "Maybe they've been possessed!".  
  
BHAM!  
  
Two red lumps formed on each of their heads.  
  
"ITE!".  
  
"What the hell are you two doing? Go back to practice!", said Akagi in a near roar. "This is no time for gossiping".  
  
With a string of muttered curses and 'ouches' from them, they did as their captain ordered them to do.  
  
But Akagi couldn't help overhearing what they were talking about. He glanced over at his two other Shohoku teammate members, Rukawa and the idiot, Sakuragi and couldn't help but wonder by himself what the heck was going on.  
  
***  
  
On the other hand, Anzai sensei who also noticed this incredible change just smiled at the scene before him.   
  
'A storm in the nation', he thought smiling into his herbal tea as he watched both of them struggling for the same ball.  
  
'Indeed'.  
  
"Ho, ho, ho".  
  
***  
  
"I've still got 20 000 shots to go till we have our match against Akita Shoten", said Sakuragi as he huffed and puffed from exertion.  
  
'That do'aho's a terror', thought Rukawa as he too huffed and puffed from exertion. 'A week had just past and he had already almost finished getting all of his 40 000 shots finished'.  
  
"You'll never finish it", said Rukawa faintly but enough for Sakuragi to have caught it.  
  
"NANI?!", said Sakuragi outraged.  
  
Rukawa ignored him and went off to the locker room to freshen himself up.  
  
"Oi, Kitsune!".  
  
He ignored him.  
  
"Rukawa!".  
  
This time Rukawa sighed but turned to face him.   
  
Irritated, he said coolly, "Nanda?".  
  
Sakuragi grinned evilly then executed a perfect 3 pointer shot.  
  
"How was that? Pretty tensai, huh?".  
  
Rukawa slightly rolled his eyes upward before turning around and proceeded to go to the locker room. But before he did that, he muttered, "Whatever, do'aho".  
  
Sakuragi just laughed his idiotic loud laugh and yelled, "19 999 shots to go!".   
  
###END OF CHAPTER###  
  
Yeah, I know. There's still no action but hey, don't sweat it. The next chapter is about the Akita Shoten match. There's bound to be some action here I guarantee you.  
  
Review all you like. Whether it's good or bad, I'll both accept it and appreciate it.  
  
Thanks for taking your time to read my fanfic!  
  
My e-mail address: shiyuchiyuki@yahoo.com or yuki_ne@hotmail.com 


	5. CHAPTER 05: Akita match

Disclaimer: Without saying, I didn't create SLAM DUNK much less owning it (- _-;) or else I would have continued the SD series and make Sakuragi and Rukawa (as well as the rest of the players) become the best of the best of players the world had ever seen.  
  
A/N: my mail's yuki_ne@hotmail.com, ya know what to do.  
  
This chapter had been rechecked and edited by shiyuchiyuki on 3/16/2004 10:30 AM  
  
05: Akita match  
  
The night before the match..  
  
"Five more shots to go", yelled Sakuragi happily almost bouncing around like a happy kid on Christmas day.  
  
Rukawa, who was at the sidelines watching his progress with his 3 pointers, just slightly rolled his eyes at the display. However, he had to admit yet again, the guy really was a terror and understood now partially why Anzai sensei thought him to be what he is despite how the idiot acts like most of the time.  
  
Indeed, Sakuragi was making progress. With each shot he made, it went right through the net. Rukawa wondered what lucky star that he was born under. He did not believe much in luck but then again he didn't really believe Sakuragi to have a real talent in the sport either.  
  
"One more shot to go!" yelled Sakuragi at the top of his lungs.  
  
Rukawa sighed. 'The idiot never can control his voice', he thought with irritation.  
  
But he could. In fact, when he concentrated in doing his last shot, he was so quiet that Rukawa could only hear the crickets chirping in that night at the outdoor court.  
  
He watched Sakuragi execute the last shot and shook his head knowing that the ball will, without a doubt, go through the net.  
  
'Do'aho'.  
  
The ball went right through.  
  
"YOSH!" yelled Sakuragi in triumph and was laughing his insane laughter off.  
  
"Urusee, do'aho", said Rukawa, but of course Sakuragi ignored him.  
  
Rukawa shook his head slightly before he turned and went off.  
  
"Oi, Rukawa!"  
  
"Nanda?" said Rukawa, still walking away without turning back.  
  
"I'll make that shot tomorrow and don't forget!"  
  
Rukawa gave out a small sigh then turned around. "You don't forget or temme korosu (or I'll kill you)".  
  
But Sakuragi was not threatened instead he laughed insanely. "You're talking to a tensai here, kitsune (fox)!"  
  
Rukawa ignored him and went off.  
  
"Oyasuminasai! Good night!)"  
  
***  
  
The big day has arrived..  
  
Morning.  
  
"NYA HA HA !" laughed Sakuragi loudly and insanely (as usual) the next morning when they started their light warm up work out before they went off for their next match.  
  
"Now what?" said Kyota more than irritated at the red head's sudden burst of laughter although it was not anything unusual. He glared at the red head and said to the nearest person beside him, "Has anyone bothered to get a professional psychiatrist for that forever baka?"  
  
Jin, who was beside him, looked up and looked at him with a puzzled expression on his face. "Who needs a psychiatrist?"  
  
Kyota sighed in exasperation and gestured towards Sakuragi. "Who else? That Akage saru over there".  
  
Jin frowned as he looked over at the red head who was still laughing loudly and saw Akagi and Uozumi on the verge of bashing his grass like head off.  
  
"Is there something wrong with his mind?" asked Jin,  
  
"Is there ..", Kyota looked at him as if he was the one out of his mind. "Can't you see that the guy is in serious need of a shrink?"  
  
"He looks perfectly healthy and normal as usual to me".  
  
Kyota groaned in exasperation.  
  
Sendoh laughed.  
  
"You know Kyota, Sakuragi does look healthy but I see your point. Though I don't think he needs a shrink".  
  
"You have got to be kidding".  
  
"Looks like he's up to something", commented Miyagi.  
  
"Yare, yare. Whenever he laughs like that there's bound to be something up in that mind of his", said Mitsui, dryly.  
  
"I thought he always laughs like that", pointed out Jin.  
  
"Not like that", said Miyagi jerking his thumb toward his back at Sakuragi's direction.  
  
"Ah", said Mitsui nodding his head in agreement.  
  
"Look, Akagi-san and Uozumi-san's going to bash his head", said Kyota, snickering.  
  
"Mah. Mah", said Sendoh shaking his head as he too witnessed the volcanic eruption flowing from both captains.  
  
But then...  
  
Rukawa happened to pass by Sakuragi who was still laughing like anything. The raven head puffed out an exasperated little sigh and said in his usual low and cool voice but it was enough for all of them to hear.  
  
"Temme korosu if you don't play your part later, do'aho", he said before walking away from him to do some warming up on his own.  
  
Almost immediately, Sakuragi stopped laughing and yelled back at him. "You too, kitsune! (fox!)"  
  
After that, he did some serious work out all the while hardly making a sound or complaint much less a laugh.  
  
Needless to say, Akagi and Uozumi did not get a chance to bash his head much to Kyota's disappointment.  
  
Sendoh, on the other hand, looked genuinely puzzled at the exchange that he, like the others, had heard. "You're right. Something is up. Not only with Sakuragi himself but also with Rukawa".  
  
"Ah", said Hanagata who had appeared beside him. "I'm sure that it's none of our business but aren't those two suppose to kill each other one way or another?".  
  
Fukuda nodded and silently, looking as puzzled as everyone else, said "They're supposed to".  
  
Kyota shook his head. "I think I'll never understand those two".  
  
"Nai, nai", agreed Sendoh with a half somewhat amused grin. "I think all of us will never do".  
  
***  
  
Fifteen minutes till the game starts and all of them, 20 members altogether that represented the Kanagawa prefecture team, were in the locker room that were provided for them.  
  
In five minutes, they would go out into the indoor court stadium and have what looked to be their most challenging match yet.  
  
"Listen, minna (everyone)", said Taoka sensei motioning for all of them to circle over the three coaches. "We've worked long and hard for these past months since we entered this tournament.."  
  
"... and you all should remember that no matter how strong the opponent is, you are stronger", finished Takato sensei with a grin.  
  
"Right", said Toaka sensei slightly annoyed that the other sensei had taken his line.  
  
"Well then, ganbete yo, minna!" said Takato sensei.  
  
"OH!"  
  
"Who's going to win this game!" said Taoka sensei.  
  
"We are!"  
  
"Yosh! That's the spirit!"  
  
Anzai Sensei, on the other hand, just chuckled at the enthusiasm and spirit of everyone in the room.  
  
"Sa", he said, standing up. "Let's go".  
  
***  
  
"So we meet again, Akagi", said the number seven player, Kawata (from Sannoh who was also the current number one centre in the nation) to Akagi baring his teeth in a mocking sneer. "I didn't think *you'd* be one of the players chosen to represent your prefecture".  
  
All of the players were in their starting positions and were ready to do war with their opponents the second the referee blows his whistle.  
  
The starting members of the Kanagawa prefectual team were Akagi, Fujima, Ikegami, Fukuda and Kyota.  
  
Akagi, though not visibly, tensed at his mocking words. He glared at him and growled, "Yeah, right. Same with you, my friend".  
  
"Che", scoffed Kawata at his retaliation.  
  
Both then visibly tensed when the referee came over to stand between them, holding the ball high in the air.  
  
"We'll win this time, Akagi. Keep that in mind", said Kawata just as the referee was about to throw up the ball.  
  
"Che!" said Akagi as both of them jumped up high in the air in pursuit of the ball. "You keep this in mind, Kawata", both of their outstretched hands almost reaching the ball. "We are the ones who will win this game".  
  
With that, Akagi immediately reached for the ball at an incredible height.  
  
"Fujima!" he roared as he smashed the ball to his side like a batting ram.  
  
The ball zoomed in an orange blur like lightning towards the light brown haired point guard who were ready to receive the expected throw.  
  
"YOSH!" yelled Fujima the second the ball touched his hands. "SOKO (Fast break), MINNA!"  
  
"HO!"  
  
And they were off.  
  
The first half of the game went in a blur with the Kanagawa team almost scoring the first score in the first minute but unfortunately was stopped in the last second by Kawata who was in full steam. Needless to say, the other prefectual team had made the points first.  
  
They were only in the first half of the game, with only few of the best players from both teams involved in it, and yet the game was already as tough as hell.  
  
However, the player from both teams who had yet to have their turn in the game could not wait to play in the second half which was bound to be twice or even thrice as tough as first half.  
  
When the first half ended, the score between both teams were 57 (Kanagawa) to 65 (Akita).  
  
Kanagawa was 8 points behind.  
  
***  
  
At Shohoku's bench...  
  
"Not bad, Fujima, Miyagi", said Maki giving each of them a high five. "Leave the rest to us".  
  
"Ah", said Sendoh grinning and who also exchanged high fives with them.  
  
"Make sure you do a good job at it", said Fujima to Maki in a challenging tone.  
  
Maki laughed. "Count on it".  
  
"One advice though", said Miyagi toweling his sweaty head. "Don't ever let your guards down. The guys especially the point getters are tough".  
  
"Ah", said Sendoh solemnly with a grin. "Wakatayorou".  
  
***  
  
"That Kawata guy is one tough and annoying guy", said Hanagata as he and the other three centers walked together like the rest towards their locker room.  
  
"Ah", agreed Akagi. "You are not kidding".  
  
"Has he always been like that?" asked Uozumi who had not has a turn in the first half.  
  
"Iie", replied Akagi shaking his head slightly and frowned. "He was even worse when we had a game with them in the last IH games".  
  
"You think we're going to face him again in the second half?", asked Takesago who was like Uozumi.  
  
"Definitely".  
  
***  
  
"Hey, what the heck is the matter with Mitsui-san?" asked Hasegawa.  
  
Mitsui was lying flat, face down on the floor of the locker room, appearing to be completely immobile.  
  
Miyagi shrugged and simply said, "He's dead".  
  
"I feel like I want to join him too", said Ikegami slumping on a nearby bench. "I seriously don't think I've anymore energy left. Playing defense against them was hell".  
  
"Looks like Mitsui-san's not the only on who's dead", said Sendoh as he watched, in amusement, at Fukuda who was swaying like a drunk as he walked into the locker room and fell down like a tree flat on his side with a faint thud. "It must have been one hell of a game just now".  
  
"No kidding", said Takano dryly and wearily who was leaning against the wall of the lockers for support. "I just went in to play for five minutes and went out like a squashed melon".  
  
"What are you talking about?", said Miyamasu tiredly. "I didn't even last for two minutes and was already rolled over by a bulldozer flat like an American pancake by the time I went out of the game".  
  
"Ok, boys, let's just stop complaining, shall we? We've got only less than fifteen minutes till the second half starts so lets join our heads together and make up some good plans", sensei, kainan's coach.  
  
"Are we all here?", asked Taoka sensei, counting everyone's head.  
  
Then..  
  
"Where's Sakuragi, Kyota and Rukawa?"  
  
***  
  
Kyota, though dead tired from the game, was quietly spying on Sakuragi and Rukawa, who were outside the locker room in the hallway. They were unbelievably (at least in Kyota's opinion) talking to each other about something.  
  
"It's our turn afterwards, so you better not mess up, do'aho", said Rukawa, giving him a searing glare that he meant business. "Or else like I told you before I'll temme korosu (I'll kill you)".  
  
Sakuragi sighed in exasperation then snickered. "Never thought you'd ever depend on me, kitsune (fox)".  
  
"Whoever said I was depending on you? Che. You know I can do much better than you do, do'aho".  
  
"Nandato?!".  
  
"Don't waste it. Oh, yeah. Don't forget to get the rebounds either, though you're an idiot all the time, the rebounds will be easy enough for you".  
  
"DID YOU JUST INSULT ME, KITSUNE?!".  
  
"Of course", came the dry reply.  
  
"TEMME!".  
  
"Save your energy, nuts. Or you'll never get it".  
  
Sakuragi stopped his advance of murdering him right the and there.  
  
Kyota who was not far away from them couldn't help but be puzzled by his unusual reaction.  
  
"Che", said Sakuragi through gritted teeth. "What are you talking about, kitsune? I've got bottomless energy and you know it!".  
  
"Really?".  
  
Sakuragi looked like he might just wring his neck but managed, to Kyota's surprise, to hold back.  
  
"I just realized something", said Sakuragi suddenly looking puzzled. "Since you are one 'blank' person I've ever known, how in hell are you going to accomplish the deal we agreed upon?".  
  
'Deal?', thought Kyota puzzled. 'What the heck are they talking about? What deal? They couldn't have made a deal! If it is though, what the heck is it?'.  
  
"What do you mean by I'm a 'blank' person, do'aho?", murmured Rukawa dangerously.  
  
But Sakuragi did not seem to notice this fact. He shrugged. "I meant that you don't react most of the time".  
  
"Like you, you mean?", he murmured in that still dangerous tone of voice. "Of course I don't, nuts. Besides, I'm no idiot like you. I have my own way of doing it".  
  
'Doing what 'it'?', Kyota thought with irritated impatience as his curiosity accelerated.  
  
"How?".  
  
"Like I'm going to tell you", muttered Rukawa as he went inside the locker room.  
  
"Oi, Rukawa! Tell me how you're to do it!. OI!", said Sakuragi coming after Rukawa with his fist waving at him as if he wanted to beat the crap out of him if he did not answer his question.  
  
After a minute or two, Kyota followed them inside.  
  
'What the heck are those two up to?', he wondered.  
  
***  
  
"FIGHT!".  
  
"Ho!".  
  
"FIGHT!"  
  
"Ho!".  
  
"FIGHT!"  
  
"HO!!!".  
  
"My, aren't we spirited today", commented Anzai Sensei with his infamous Santa Claus chuckle.  
  
"Of course they are, Anzai sensei. They have to after all beat the possibly best team the nation has ever seen", said Taoka sensei.  
  
"Ah..".  
  
"I agree", said Takato sensei. He waved his favorite fan in front of his face. "I'm glad that they are not intimidated by their power though".  
  
Toaka sensei nodded his head in agreement at the other sensei's words.  
  
"Iie", said the quiet old man who sat in between the two coaches and who were taken aback, surprised at his disagreement.  
  
"Nanda?", asked Toaka sensei.  
  
"They are intimidated by their power", said Anzai sensei.  
  
"Eh?"  
  
"Sa"  
  
"Nani?"  
  
"Never mind how come, Toaka sensei and Takato sensei. Fact is it does not matter if they are intimidated or not".  
  
"Nandato?"  
  
The white haired sensei just smiled.  
  
"Our boys are strong. That's enough for them to go through any obstacle they may encounter including this one".  
  
"Soka.."  
  
***  
  
"Yo. Didn't expect you to still be here", said the still currently best high school player in the nation, Sawakita Eiji.  
  
They both faced each other in their starting positions with Sawakita smiling at Rukawa apparently delighted at having to face and compete with him again. Rukawa just frowned at him coolly apparently not impressed by the other player's greeting.  
  
"Che", said Rukawa in that cool low voice of his but did not say anything else.  
  
"The last time we had a match together, I thought you said something about going to the U.S. ", said Sawakita referring to their conversation back at the time they had a match together.  
  
Rukawa slightly raised an eyebrow. "Is that all that you can remember?".  
  
Sawakita frowned then looked thoughtfully at him. "Soka,. You also said hat you'll go there after you beat me".  
  
Coolly, Rukawa replied an affirmative. "Exactly".  
  
The answer made Sawakita grin. He had always loved challenges and this one was no less.  
  
"Your team winning the game against us last time didn't convince you that you had beaten me?".  
  
"Che, baka", muttered Rukawa almost irritatingly. "Whoever said anything about me being unconvinced that I've beaten you? Besides we never did settle it, did we?".  
  
Sawakita grinned. "Ah".  
  
From beside him, the best point guard high school player, Fukatsu who was guarded by Maki said, "Sawakita, Let's go".  
  
Sawakita gave him a thumb's up and a grin. "Oh, yeah. Let's beat them up!".  
  
***  
  
"Nandato!", growled Sakuragi hearing Sawakita's insulting words. He shook his fist at the player and yelled, "Not on your life, baldie!".  
  
"SAKURAGI! Mind on the game!", Akagi roared from the bench, his fists waving like a baseball bat. He was also being restrained ,with every difficulty, by the other Kanagawa basketball members.  
  
Sakuragi winced at his captain's roar. "Wakatayorou, Gori!".  
  
Kyota who was also at the bench was trying hard not to laugh at the scene that the Shohoku captain was making.  
  
"Do'aho! What the hell are you doing? The game's on!", said Rukawa, chasing after a blurry figure that had past right beside him.  
  
"Nani?!", yelled Sakuragi outraged at whoever had just past him. He zoomed at the blurry figure. "I'll get you for that!".  
  
***  
  
At the bench..  
  
Almost everyone at the bench except Anzai sensei looked blankly at them.  
  
"Ooookk...", said Mitsui who had just come back from the dead looking just as pale as a still dead body from the exertion of the play in the first half. He turned to the person beside him and said slowly, "I'm still alive, right? Or am I still in the dead world? Because I could've sworn Rukawa had actually yelled at Sakuragi..".  
  
Miyagi who was the one sitting beside him and had his eyes as big and round as saucers and his jaw hanging off its hinges could not even form a word.  
  
Sendoh, on the other hand, after a moment of shock, laughed.  
  
"The guy can actually yell", said Sendoh bemused, shaking his head. "No wonder though. That's Sakuragi he's yelling at. Nobody is that immune to his outrageous behavior".  
  
"You mean baka behavior", said Akagi who had also recovered from his shock and now looked more than a little bit disbelieving.  
  
While the other players who were on the bench and had their part in the play earlier in the first half, except for Maki, Uozumi and Jin who were in the game were either still in shock at the unusual display or they had just realized that Rukawa was like any other human being, one who has his own style of showing his emotions, be they be annoyance or whatever.  
  
There was only one player who acted out of character on the bench. The person who was supposed to be the one who would comment or rather make an immediate opinion of 'outrageous disbelief' on Rukawa's unusual act of yelling. However, only Sendoh had noticed this slight.  
  
Sendoh looked and studied Kyota's quiet form thoughtfully with a twitch of a smile at the ends of his lips, starting yet again to feel amused at something. With one of his eyebrows rising following his amusement, he said to Kyota who was sitting beside him and who was frowning and watching the game with his complete attention.  
  
"Nanda? Don't you have a comment on that, Kyota-kun?", said Sendoh, grinning as Kyota seemed to jump, startled, when he realized that Sendoh was talking to him.  
  
He turned blankly at him looking distracted and said, "Nani? Gomen. I didn't catch what you say".  
  
At this Sendoh became more amused and grinned. Then with a careless shrug, he said, "Nothing, actually. It wasn't anything important".  
  
Again, Kyota gave him a blank look although there was a reflection of slight puzzlement in his eyes before he turned back to watch the game in silence which was pretty unusual for Kyota since in every game, whether it was a practice game or an actual game, he would make some sort of noise, of which a couple of his favorites were hysterical laughter and illogical loud arguments.  
  
Sendoh turned to watch the game but he couldn't help feeling that something was up, not only with Sakuragi and Rukawa but also with Kyota himself.  
  
@@@  
  
It was bad.  
  
It was really, really bad.  
  
And that's not the end of it.  
  
Because things were going to get much worse than bad.  
  
Ten minutes left on the clock till the end of the second half and the end of the game.  
  
The end of their last game.  
  
Because their score was going nowhere near anywhere.  
  
67 (Kanagawa)  
  
100 (Akita)  
  
This time for sure no miracle was going to help them since it sure as hell look pretty obvious that they were nowhere else to go but get doomed.  
  
Correction, they were already doomed.  
  
Besides, the players of the other team were just too much to bear with.  
  
At first the game went on well enough even though for the first few minutes of the game neither of the teams could gain any scores as both teams refused to let the other gain entry of each of their territories. But after that, the game slowly but gradually changed with Akita scoring first.  
  
But then the Kanagawa team was not to be left behind as they raced against the other team with matching speed and skill. Eventually, less than five minutes later, each of the teams had tied their score with Rukawa and Sawakita as the biggest point getters for each team.  
  
However after that, the Kanagawa players began to make some mistakes.  
  
Maki who was still playing as a point guard that time was over used and his stamina was nearly expired. Guarding Fukatsu, the best high school point guard in the nation, was not helping matters either.  
  
His exhaustion was beginning to wear him down and his weariness was especially obvious when he made one but fatal mistake.  
  
He had actually wanted to make a pass to Rukawa by slipping sleekly under Fukatsu's lowered arms in front of him to break the strong defense barrier when his legs had suddenly gave way and he fell head on like a bull towards Fukatsu.  
  
Needless to say, he was charged with intentional foul. Because of that the ball was in their opponent's possession and they gained a couple of free throws.  
  
It was a shock for the Kanagawa team since Maki rarely makes mistakes and when he did it was not anything as serious as this.  
  
The senseis of the Kanagawa team had to pull him out of the game then because it was obvious that he was not in any condition to play anymore.  
  
Sendoh replaced Maki which was as well since Sendoh was one of the few who were still fresh and had not had a turn in the game.  
  
Maki was not the only one who had to be replaced.  
  
Uozumi had unbelievably made a series of fouls with most of them caused by his impatient nature and temper. He simply was not Kawata's match both in skills and patience. Kawata, on the other hand, had hardly used much of his skills around the big guy. He had but only to taunt him mercilessly and make him so angry that he was charged with a foul of unsportmanship and was kicked out of the game.  
  
Akagi replaced Uozumi who got an earful from him as if it was not bad enough that he got kicked out and humiliated. His own sensei was also not to be left behind in yelling at him to death.  
  
Jin also had to be replaced. He did not do anything wrong exactly though he was almost as tired as his comrade, Maki. No. It was just that his 3 pointer skills were not getting anywhere near the net. He was too closely and tightly guarded by this humongous and tall player who should have been a sumo wrestler (though I've never heard of a tall sumo wrestler before) than a basketball player. When he did shoot, however, it was either that it did not get anywhere in mid air or there were just too many hands at the net waiting eagerly to either snatch or smash it away like a bat on a baseball hitting it for homerun.  
  
Kyota replaced Jin despite his own weariness bearing down on him. Actually, someone else was suppose to fill in the shoes for Jin but Kyota had wanted, no ..begged the senseis so that he'd be the one to replace him. With some reluctance and hesitance, they eventually gave in and allowed him in the game.  
  
Only two players were not replaced.  
  
Sakuragi Hanamichi and Rukawa Kaede.  
  
Needless to say, Kanagawa's mistakes gave every advantage there was to Akita with Sawakita again scoring most of the points, more than half the score, and Kawata bearing as the second biggest point getter.  
  
Of course, throughout the whole game Rukawa stood out and so did the rest of the team members of the Kanagawa team as well as the Akita team displaying their ever incredible and amazing skills.  
  
Except, however and curiously enough, for a certain flaming red head.  
  
***  
  
In the audience, on the front row of the seats sat Sakuragi's gundam, Haruko and her two friends.  
  
They had been cheering, as always in every game, throughout the play as loud and as supportive as the rest of the people in the enormous basketball court stadium.  
  
However, the gundam members felt that something was missing in the picture where Sakuragi was concerned.  
  
Youhei was the first one to make a comment on it.  
  
He nudged Takamiya who was sitting beside him and who was bashing some empty bottles on the rail in front of them making as much noise as they possibly could said, "Takamiya, something's up with Sakuragi. He's not acting much like himself at all".  
  
"WHAT?!", said Takamiya cupping his ear because he couldn't hear a thing about what Yohei had said. "DID YOU SAY SOMETHING, YOUHEI? I CAN'T HEAR YOU OVER THE NOISE AROUND HERE!"  
  
Youhei had to rub his own ears since Takamiya had directly yelled into them. Youhei sighed in exasperation then grabbed hold of Takamiya's ear, pulled it towards him ignoring his yells of pain and repeated what he had said to him.  
  
"NOW YOU MENTION IT HE IS ACTING NOTHING LIKE HIMSELF ALTHOUGH I HAVE TO SAY HE IS DOING QUITE A GOOD JOB IN THE GAME. I MEAN HIM BEING NOT KICKED FOR HIS FOULS. BY THE WAY HOW MANY FOULS DID HE GET ANYWAY?"  
  
Youhei feeling more than annoyed now not only because he knew that he was going to get deaf soon if Takamiya continued to yell like he couldn't hear a thing to what he was saying but also with his no sense of indiscretion of what he was saying.  
  
Haruko was sitting just beside him and Youhei did not want her to hear about what they were saying and get unnecessarily worried.  
  
Youhei slapped the back of Takamiya's head, though not so hard, and told him to shut up and speak as quietly and discretely as possible so as not to worry Haruko.  
  
"Itai!", said Takamiya holding the back of his stinging head. "You could've just told me to keep quiet".  
  
Takamiya spread Youhei's remark to Okosu and Noma then wanting their opinions on it.  
  
"Yeah. You're right. I know that something was missing besides him not getting out of the court because of his fouls. By the way, how many fouls did he get?"  
  
"That's just what I was wondering but I've lost track of it", said Takamiya.  
  
"Hmm", said Noma scratching his head. "Has he got something in mind do you think?"  
  
"Well, if he does I hope he does it some time soon because it sure does not look too good for the Kanagawa team right now", said Youhei glancing at the scoreboard which still showed the Kanagawa's stagnant score but increasing score of the opponent's team.  
  
***  
  
Haruko who was oblivious to the gundam's discussion of Sakuragi and was silently trying to hold back her tears which had been trying to come out since the moment the Kanagawa team fell.  
  
Through unshed tears, she saw a blur version of the game. She saw it through slow motion. She especially paid close attention to her onisan who was struggling to get a hold up of the team and the situation around him. His expression of determination and stubbornness of not wanting to yet be defeated in the game only made her tears want to come out more. She bit her lower lip and tried to calm down. It would not do any good if she cried right now when she should be giving support to her brother who loved basketball more than anything like herself.  
  
She shut her eyes tightly not caring the one tear that had successfully slide down her cheeks and clasped her both of her hands in prayer and prayed in her heart. 'Please, help my onisan throughout this game, lord. Please', whispered her heart.  
  
She then opened her eyes and immediately her eyes fell upon another wholly different subject. Though, she visibly brightened by just looking at him she also wanted to cry for him because she knew how important this game was to him like her oniisan.  
  
Staring at Rukawa with the beginnings of teary eyes, she clasped her hands together even harder and whispered under her breathe the same  
  
prayer as she did for her onisan's.  
  
Then last but not least, her eyes searched through the crowd of players in the basketball court for a certain someone.  
  
'There he is', thought Haruko with a small affectionate smile for her close friend although he did not see it.  
  
He was standing near the goal post as he like everybody else waited for the other players who had a chance at a fee throw. He was looking pretty tense and concentrated.  
  
Clasping her hands together but not so hard now and in fact in a relaxed hold, she bowed her head on her clasped hands and said a silent prayer with all her heart.  
  
After her last prayer she felt much better because she knew that her prayer would be answered.  
  
Whispers...  
  
'Lord, please...'  
  
'I have always have faith with you. Please, help me now. Help my friend succeed throughout this game please...'  
  
'Please...'  
  
'I ask you this once because...'  
  
'I trust my friend as much as I trust you...'  
  
'Because he is Sakuragi Hanamichi..'.  
  
'The savior that you had help me chose'  
  
'Please...'  
  
'Let miracles happen today'  
  
###END OF CHAPTER###  
  
Only ONE word.  
  
Doumo. ^^  
  
..for taking the time reading the fic. 


	6. 06: Striving towards the same goal TO BE...

A/N: YOH! Hey, I'm back.  
  
To all the readers who have long read my fic and have waited a long time to read it again... GOMEN NASAI! Please forgive me for not updating for a long time now since what? Almost a whole year. Yow!  
  
If you want to flame me, by all means I more than deserve it. If you want to say nice things, well... Doumo. ^^;  
  
Hn. As usual disclaimers apply here. I don't own SLAM DUNK however the all star combi in this fic was my idea ^^;  
  
Hope you enjoy this chap!  
  
Btw: A/N: This is NON-YAOI. Story takes place after Shohoku's match against Sannoh. Their match against Sannoh can be found in the last six volumes of SD.  
  
Btw, warning: language (ok maybe not serious but yeah know, just in case)  
  
Chapter edited and rechecked by shiyuchiyuki for the second time 3/18/2004 11:05 AM  
  
*******  
  
An excerpt from the last chapter 05: Akita Match  
  
It was bad.  
  
It was really, really bad.  
  
And that's not the end of it.  
  
Because things were going to get worse than bad.  
  
Ten minutes left on the clock till the end of the second half and the end of the game.  
  
The end of their last game.  
  
Because their score was going nowhere near anywhere.  
  
67 (Kanagawa)  
  
100 (Akita )  
  
This time for sure no miracle was going to help them since it sure as hell look pretty obvious that they were nowhere else to go but get doomed.  
  
Correction, they were already doomed.  
  
Besides, the players of the other team were just too much to bear with.  
  
At first the game went on well enough even though for the first few minutes of the game neither of the teams could gain any scores as both teams refused to let the other gain entry of each other's territories. But after that, the game slowly but gradually changed with Akita scoring first.  
  
But then the Kanagawa team was not to be left behind as they raced against the other team with matching speed and skill. Eventually, less than five minutes later, each of the teams had tied their score with Rukawa and Sawakita as the biggest point getters for each team.  
  
However after that, the Kanagawa players began to make some mistakes.  
  
Maki who was still playing as a point guard that time was over used and his stamina was nearly expired. Guarding Fukatsu, the best high school point guard in the nation, was not helping matters either.  
  
His exhaustion was beginning to wear him down and it was especially obvious when he made one but fatal mistake.  
  
He had actually wanted to make a pass to Rukawa by slipping sleekly under Fukatsu's lowered arms in front of him to break the strong defense barrier when his legs had suddenly gave way and he fell head on like a bull towards Fukatsu.  
  
Needless to say, he was charged with intentional foul. Because of that the ball was in their opponent's possession and they gained a couple of free throws.  
  
It was a shock for the Kanagawa team since Maki rarely makes mistakes and when he did it was not anything as serious as this.  
  
The senseis of the Kanagawa team had to pull him out of the game then because it was obvious that he was not in any condition to play anymore.  
  
Sendoh replaced Maki which was as well since Sendoh was one of the few who were still fresh and had not had a turn in the game.  
  
Maki was not the only one who had to be replaced.  
  
Uozumi had unbelievably made a series of fouls with most of them caused by his impatient nature and temper. He simply was not Kawata's match both in skills and patience. Kawata, on the other hand, had hardly used much of his skills around the big guy. He had but only to taunt him mercilessly and make him so angry that he was charged with a foul of unsportmanship and was kicked out of the game.  
  
Akagi replaced Uozumi who got an earful from him as if it was not bad enough that he got kicked out and got humiliated. His own sensei was also not to be left behind in yelling at him to death.  
  
Jin also had to be replaced. He did not do anything wrong exactly though he was almost as tired as his comrade, Maki. No. It was just that his 3 pointer skills were not getting anywhere near the net. He was too closely and tightly guarded by this humongous and tall player who should have been a sumo wrestler (though I've never heard of a tall sumo wrestler before) than a basketball player. When he did shoot, however, it was either that it did not get anywhere in mid air or there were just too many hands at the net waiting eagerly to either snatch or smash it away like a bat on a baseball hitting it for homerun.  
  
Kyota replaced Jin despite his own weariness bearing down on him. Actually, someone else was suppose to fill in the shoes for Jin but Kyota had wanted, no ..begged the senseis so that he'd be the one to replace him. With some reluctance and hesitance, they eventually gave in and allowed him in the game.  
  
Only two players were not replaced.  
  
Sakuragi Hanamichi and Rukawa Kaede.  
  
Needless to say, Kanagawa's mistakes gave every advantage there was to Akita with Sawakita again scoring most of the points, more than half the score, and Kawata bearing as the second biggest point getter.  
  
Of course, throughout the whole game Rukawa stood out and so did the rest of the team members of the Kanagawa team as well as the Akita team displaying their ever incredible and amazing skills.  
  
Except, however and curiously enough, for a certain flaming red head.  
  
+++  
  
06: Striving towards the same goal; TO BE THE NO#1 PLAYER!  
  
A whistle blew off signaling a time out.  
  
The Kanagawa team had been the one that had requested it.  
  
The time on the scoreboard showed a frozen time of exactly nine minutes till the end of the last half of the game.  
  
The game that could turn out to be their last if they did not do anything about it.  
  
And the three senseis of the Kanagawa teams sure as hell were going to do something about it.  
  
"What the hell is the matter with you people?! What happened to all of you in this game? None of you are doing the best as you should be except for Rukawa", said Taoka sensei, the Ryonan coach, in a near shout. A vein or two were popping out of his temple. "And you!" he continued pointing an accusing finger at Sendoh who had a hand behind his back in a sheepish grin. "Stop with that grin! What the hell are you doing? You still warming up or something?! Forget that and get serious! Smash those Akita players like they deserve!"  
  
However, unlike the Ryonan coach Takato sensei who was Kainan's coach was cooler and level headed and tried to calm the other coach down. "Mah, mah. Calm down, Taoka sensei. I'm sure that they had played their best as they can.."  
  
His comment only made Taoka sensei glower at him. "The best?! We're 34, I repeat 34 points behind the other team!"  
  
"Nevertheless, calm down, Taoka sensei. We need this time to make a plan that could counter the other team so scolding our players right now is out of the question", said Takato sensei with a serious expression on his face as he fanned himself with his favorite paper fan.  
  
Realizing that what the other coach had said rang true, Taoka sensei made a visible effort to calm down much to the other players of the team's relief and to Sendoh's amusement though he didn't show it.  
  
It was rare to see his sensei trying to quench his anger and impatience aside mused Sendoh to himself with a hidden half grin at his sensei's effort.  
  
Glancing at the scoreboard and at his watch, Takato sensei then said, "We've got only 2 minutes on the clock. We'll have to make this quick".  
  
Everyone gathered around the two coaches including the ones that wasn't playing in the game right then.  
  
However, no one save Kyota and Sendoh noticed that a certain raven head and a certain flaming red head weren't in the group.  
  
+++  
  
"Rukawa-kun. Sakuragi-kun. Chotto. Come over here for a bit. I'll have a word with you two", said their coach, Anzai sensei.  
  
Without hesitation, they went straight towards their sensei who was leisurely drinking a cup of herbal tea and was sitting quiet a distance away from the other players and the other coaches.  
  
Tension crackled in between the gap that separated both Sakuragi and Rukawa and it was getting dangerous by the minute but the sensei gave no heed to its presence.  
  
"What is it, Oya-ji?", said Sakuragi through gritted teeth, sensing the tension wasn't going anywhere near anywhere gone.  
  
Rukawa just remained quiet on his side but he looked pretty dangerous as if he was ready to kill someone.  
  
Preferably the one that was standing beside him.  
  
Anzai sensei took his time sipping his herbal tea which grated on Sakuragi's already dangerously thin nerve.  
  
Rukawa just narrowed his eyes and waited for the sensei to continue.  
  
Finally the sensei spoke.  
  
"Why are you here?"  
  
The question that came out of nowhere and unexpected made both players blink in surprise and left taken aback.  
  
However, Sakuragi blinked more than once and looked confused by his sensei's question.  
  
Rukawa, on the other hand, only blinked once and looked on blankly by it.  
  
"Oi, Oya-ji", said Sakuragi, going over his sensei and stretching out the loose skin hanging down his sensei's chin up and down like a rubber band. "What do you mean by that? We're here because we're playing against the Akita team of course!"  
  
Rukawa didn't say anything but said, "Hn", as if agreeing with Sakuragi on that point.  
  
Anzai sensei who didn't seem to mind with Sakuragi playing with his chin said, "Ho, ho, ho. What I meant by that was the big picture, Sakuragi-kun. Rukawa-kun".  
  
Sakuragi stopped playing with his sensei's chin and said, "Big picture? What big picture?"  
  
Anzai sensei just smiled and repeated. "Why are you here, Rukawa-kun?"  
  
Anzai looked expectantly at his student for his answer. Sakuragi followed suit but looked on at him with a glare.  
  
Rukawa pointedly ignored the red head do'aho and instead slightly frowned at his sensei's expectant expression.  
  
It was a while before Rukawa answered slowly almost muttering to himself, "I *will* become the #1 player in Japan".  
  
"NANI?!", yelled Sakuragi jumping off the bench he was sitting on beside his sensei and advanced on Rukawa, attempting to strangle him on the spot.  
  
However, the sensei stopped him with a question directed at him.  
  
"How about you, Sakuragi-kun? Why are you here?"  
  
Forgetting his killing intention, Sakuragi spun around and faced his sensei, the beginnings of his tensai grin forming on his face. "Nanda yo, Oya-ji. Tensai Basketman Hanamichi Sakuragi's here to kick some butt and conquer the world of baskteball!"  
  
Shooting a pointed glare at Rukawa who pointedly gave him no heed then added. "And I *will* become the #1 basketball player in the world!"  
  
Rukawa rolled his eyes at that and said, "That is not going to happen, do'aho".  
  
"TEMME! You think this TENSAI can't do it?", yelled Sakuragi angrily at his rival.  
  
Rukawa gave away the slightest of smirks, "You'd have to beat me first, do'aho".  
  
"TEMME!", yelled Sakuragi heading straight for his neck in a death grip but once again Anzai sensei stopped him with his trademark chuckle.  
  
Both heads turned towards their sensei, with Sakuragi once again forgetting his killing intention towards the kitsune who stood next to him.  
  
"What's so funny, Oya-ji?", said Sakuragi annoyed at his sensei's habitual chuckle that usually comes out of nowhere and at the most unusual times.  
  
"Iie", said his sensei, with a small smile. His glasses flashed as if he knew something they didn't know.  
  
"You're not in your right mind then, Oya-ji", said Sakuragi stating what was obvious to him.  
  
That only brought another chuckle out of the round sensei.  
  
Just then the whistle that signaled the end of their time out was blown.  
  
"Is that that all, Anzai sensei?", muttered Rukawa.  
  
"Matte, both of you. I haven't finished talking to you just as yet", said the sensei pretending not to have noticed the urgent looks on the other two coaches' faces.  
  
Rukawa and Sakuragi stood where they were and watched their sensei as he put down his herbal tea onto the empty bench space next to him. He stood up and walked the few steps towards his students, with a small smile on his face.  
  
He pounded them both with either of his hands once on each of their backs bringing out surprised looks from both players.  
  
"Ganbatte yo, Rukawa-kun. Sakuragi-kun. Both of you are the most talented players I have ever had and seen in a while and I am proud to have both of you as my students", said Anzai sensei with a smile that showed both, his encouragement, his support and pride for them.  
  
Sakuragi was touched by this but did not say anything.  
  
Rukawa as usual had his cool expression, showing nothing of what he might have felt for or thought of his sensei's words.  
  
"I have no doubt that both of you", he said nodding at both of them. "..will become the best of the best of players in the basketball world in the near future". He paused and then gestured his arm in a wave at the crowd surrounding them and at the court before them. Both of the players followed at the direction where he was waving at.  
  
"This", the sensei continued, "is only one of the first of the many steps for you to reach that ultimate goal. The goal to be the BEST".  
  
Both silent players concentrated intently on what their sensei was saying, knowing that what the older man in front of them was saying was what was going to change their basketball lives forever.  
  
Their sensei smiled before saying his last words to them.  
  
"Two storms in one nation ", he said his smile slightly widened and the eyes behind the thick glasses sparkled a bit.  
  
"Both of you are going to rock the world of basketball".  
  
"So go out there and show them all of what you got!", encouraged the sensei before the last warning whistle, to the start of the last nine minutes of the game, went off.  
  
Sakuragi and Rukawa looked at their sensei then with different sorts of expressions on their faces before they respectfully bowed at him and went off to the court and to their respective positions.  
  
'It's up to them now', thought Anzai sensei silently as he watched his students take their places and glanced at the score board. He frowned slightly but then it was replaced by a small smile. 'The difference in score is very far right now but I have faith in the Kanagawa players'.  
  
He watched Sakuragi and Rukawa, both tense in action.  
  
'Especially in those two', he thought. 'No matter how far the difference of scores is, if both of them work together...".  
  
He chuckled then to himself and sat back down on the bench. He then continued drinking his already cooled down herbal tea.  
  
'.. the result would be astonishing'.  
  
"Ho. Ho. Ho. This will be an interesting match. Indeed".  
  
......................  
  
TBC..  
  
Hello again, ppl! ^_^.  
  
Thanks for taking the time to read this fic. ^^  
  
If you want to continue reading what will happen next, review please! Review= inspire to write more!  
  
BTW, the score is pretty far isn't it? So who do you think will win? Akita or the Kanagawa team? Hey, don't think that I'm going to be biased and let the Kanagawa team win! Besides, their opponent is damn strong.  
  
And do you think that either Sakuragi or Rukawa was sort of 'OOC?' (out of character?). If you think so, can you please tell me and point out which part that OOC was in. It's so that I can do about it later if necessary. THANKS!  
  
Later! 


	7. 07: The start of a heated battle

Disclaimers: Slam Dunk belongs to Takehiko Inoue sensei. I, on the other hand, own nothing except for this fanfic ^^;  
  
A/N: This is NON-YAOI. Story takes place after Shohoku's match against Sannoh. Their match against Sannoh can be found in the last six volumes of SD.  
  
Btw, warning: language (ok maybe not serious but yeah know, just in case)   
  
Chapter editted and rechecked by shiyuchiyuki  
  
Some parts from the previous chapter i.e.   
  
06: Striving towards the same goal; TO BE THE NO#1 PLAYER!  
  
++++  
  
"Why are you here, Rukawa-kun?".  
  
Anzai looked at his student for his answer. Sakuragi followed suit but looked on at him with a glare.  
  
Rukawa pointedly ignored the red head do'aho and instead slightly frowned at his sensei's expectant expression.  
  
It was a while before Rukawa answered slowly almost muttering to himself, "I *will* become the #1 player in Japan".  
  
"NANI?!", yelled Sakuragi jumping off the bench he was sitting on beside his sensei and advanced on Rukawa, attempting to strangle him on the spot.  
  
However, the sensei stopped him with a question directed at him.  
  
"How about you, Sakuragi-kun? Why are you here?".  
  
Forgetting his killing intention, Sakuragi spun around and faced his sensei, the beginnings of his tensai grin forming on his face. "Nanda yo, Oya-ji. Tensai Basketman Hanamichi Sakuragi's here to kick some butt and conquer the world of baskteball!".  
  
Shooting a pointed glare at Rukawa who pointedly gave him no heed then added. "And I *will* become the #1 basketball player in the world!".  
  
~~~~~~~~~~  
  
'It's up to them now', thought Anzai sensei silently as he watched his students take their places and glanced at the score board. He frowned slightly but then it was replaced by a small smile. 'The difference in score is very far right now but I have faith in the Kanagawa players'.  
  
He watched Sakuragi and Rukawa, both tense in action.   
  
'Especially in those two', he thought. 'No matter how far the difference of scores is, if both of them work together...".  
  
He chuckled then to himself and sat back down on the bench. He then continued drinking his already cooled down herbal tea.  
  
'.. the result would be astonishing'.  
  
"Ho. Ho. Ho. This will be an interesting match. Indeed".  
  
~~~~~~~~~~~  
  
07: The start of a heated battle  
  
The whistle was blown.  
  
And they were off!  
  
Akita Shoten had the ball and in possession of it was their point guard, the number one point guard ace player in Japan, Fukatsu from Sannoh. Guarding him closely and tightly in front of him and on all sides was Sendoh, one of Kanagawa's own ace player.   
  
Fukatsu inconsipiously looked from left to right then all the surroundings as much as possible of what was behind his guard's back without moving his head.  
  
On his left not far off from him stood Sawakita, the No#1 high school player in Japan and who was guarded closely by Kanagawa's raven haired Super Rookie, Rukawa. Fukatsu tried to catch the eye of his teammate but Rukawa was saying something to him, distracting Sawakita's attention.  
  
Fukatsu grinded his teeth, wondering with irritation what the heck they were talking about at a situation like this.  
  
Further away from Sawakita stood, Kawata who was guarding under the basket. Standing, match to match, eye to eye with him was Kanagawa's No#1 centre, Akagi. Both of them were scrambling with each other trying to get the other behind the other's back resulting in an almost silent tug of war.   
  
'No help there', thought Fukatsu, aware that he was wasting the 10 seconds as he still had the ball in his possession. Sendoh eyeing the ball as well as his opponent's eyes didn't help much to make his decision making any easier either.  
  
Then suddenly he saw an opening to his right. Mikio Kawata, Kawata's little brother, was wide open. No one was guarding him.  
  
Without hesitation and without contemplating why he was unguarded, Fukatsu feigned moving to his left. Sendoh intercepted him there but realised his mistake when Fukatsu suddenly gave him a slight smile and threw the ball through the space that Sendoh had carelessly left wide open on his right.  
  
"Shimatta!", said Sendoh as he dashed neck to neck with Fukatsu who was running around in the opposite direction that the ball had been thrown.   
  
Knowing that he couldn't leave the point guard unguarded he yelled for his other teammates. "Rukawa! Sakuragi! Kyota! MOVE IT!".  
  
"AKAGI!", Sendoh called out in warning at the gorilla like centre of Kanagawa who were practically wrestling with Akita Shoten's own version of Boss Monkey for the perfect position for possible rebound.  
  
"DAMMIT! WHAT THE HELL ARE YOU DOING? GET THAT BALL!", yelled Miyagi and Mitsui together on the sidelines. Jumping up and down and waving theri arms frantically towards Mikio Kawata as if telling their teammates where the ball was headed.  
  
The ball which was still in the air because of the high arc that Fukatsu had executed, was now falling and zooming down rather fast and it was headed straight towards Mikio.  
  
In a blink of an eye, Sawakita ran towards Mikio but Rukawa thinking in the same line as he was, was neck to neck with him.  
  
The second the ball was within reach, Sawakita jumped from where he was, which was only a few steps away from Mikio who had also jumped and had his hands raised for the ball. However, the second the ball was about to reach either outstretched hands, Rukawa stepped in between Mikio and Sawakita and leaped higher than both...  
  
'Shimitta!', cursed Rukawa inwardly.   
  
Upon leaping one of his feet had slipped on the floor and he was now in a state of imbalance in the air.  
  
But luckily he managed to tap the ball enough so that it bounced back into the air too far from the clutches of either Mikio's or Sawakita's hands.  
  
The audience around and above them gasped.  
  
"HOLY SHIT!", yelled both Mitsui and Miyagi, relieved and yet a bit high strung on the close call.   
  
Similiar curses and various expressions followed suit that waved around the court like a small tsunami.  
  
"The ball! The ball! DON'T FORGET THE BALL!", yelled both Taoka sensei and the normally calm Takato sensei as if in a singing chorus.  
  
Then out of nowhere Kyota's hand appeared and it was closing around the ball that was still high up in the air.  
  
"WHAT THE?!!!", cried two or three of the players from the Akita Shoten team from the sidelines.  
  
Upon seeing their junior making for the ball, both Maki and Jin abruptly stood up from their seats forgetting their earlier fatigue and letting their forgotten uncapped bottle drinks splashing towards the ground.   
  
"IKKE, KYOTA!", both of them shouted, with Maki punching his fist into the air above him while Jin cupped his hands around his mouth to amplify his shout.  
  
"YOSH!!!", shouted the Kanagawa team members in a near roar that thundered through the whole indoor stadium as Kyota successfully caught the ball in his hands.  
  
He was still up in the air and was about to land on his two feet when someone's hand snaked in between Kyota's hands that held the ball and slapped it away.  
  
"DAMMIT!", yelled Kyota at Sawakita who had stolen the ball away from him.  
  
"RUKAWA!", yelled Kyota but Rukawa was already on hot pursuit of Sawakita.  
  
It was then Sendoh decided to take a chance and left Fukatsu unmarked as he dashed after Rukawa and Sawakita who were heading straight for the net.  
  
"KYOTA! GUARD FUKATSU!", yelled the normally cool spiky haired player, as he ran passed him.  
  
"Nani?!", cried Kyota but immediately ran after Fukatsu who was running around outside the three pointer line to mark him.  
  
Seeing the blur figures of three black haired players heading staright towards them, both Kawata and Akagi struggled to dominate the other in position, bracing themselves for either for offense or defense.  
  
Sawakita made an abrupt jump then, near the goal post and made his infamous shoo-in high arched jump shot.  
  
But..  
  
A finger suddenly appeared out of nowhere and it had managed to touch the ball!  
  
"What the...", said Sawakita but he then suddenly came face to face, eye to eye level with Rukawa's face, a grim and deadly half smile hanging at the edge of his lips.   
  
"I WILL become the #1 player in Japan", said Rukawa in a near growl and with it gave off a cool sharp stare at him as if challenging him to throw the words back at him him. Then in a blink of an eye. He landed onto the ground before Sawakita did and he dashed off, already after the ball.  
  
Taken aback a bit by Rukawa's sudden menacing attitude, Sawakita smiled then as he landed towards the ground, coming after Rukawa. "Not when I'm still here, pal", he muttered, accepting the challenge.  
  
Back under the basketball hoop, two primite like players pushed each other around with their full weights trying to get the perfect execution position for the rebound.  
  
The ball hit the sides of the ring and both Akagi and Kawata leaped off!  
  
As a result of both getting the perfect positions for the rebound, they both caught the ball at the same time and was now having a power struggle as to who was going to have the ball.  
  
The refree seeing it was going to be a possible 'held ball' was about to blow his whistle when suddenly he blinked back in his tracks, frozen and dazed and was taken aback at the sudden whoosh of orange-red figure that had just zoomed past him like lightning.  
  
"What the..", thought the refree. However, he was not left to wonder when..  
  
Akagi and Kawata was still in the the air and was about to land down onto solid earth when they found themselves hugging thin air.  
  
"What the hell?!", yelled Kawata, not comprehending what the hell happened to the ball that was in his grasp earlier.  
  
Akagi who had caught sight of a flash of red didn't have to guess what was happening.  
  
"NYA HA HA! BAKA KING KONG NO SANNOH! (king kong of Sannoh)", yelled Sakuragi who suddenly decided to appear out of nowhere.   
  
Holding the ball under one arm while pulling down the lower part of the skin under one of his eyes, he stuck his tongue rudely out at Kawata and said.  
  
"TENSAI BASKETMAN SAKURAGI HANAMICHI PRESENT-O!", annouced Sakuragi needlessly with his infamous tensai grin and headed off. "Later, Gori", he said to Akagi with a smirk earning him a glare and a gorilla-like roar from Akagi.  
  
"URUSEE, BAKA!", roared Akagi. " SOKKO, (Fast break) MINNA!", he blasted at the other players who were already running towards the other end of the court.  
  
"CHIKUSO! I WAS GOING TO SAY THAT, GORI!", yelled Sakuragi as he zoomed towards the other half of the court easily surpassing half of the players there.  
  
"HELL YEAH! OFFENSE! OFFENSE! OFFENSE!", yelled Mitsui, Miyagi, the normally quiet Fukuda, Koshino and Uozumi at the bench area of the Kanagawa team.  
  
"GANBATTE, HANAMICHI!", yelled Sakuragi's gundam at the top of their lungs, and making as much noise as possible with their empty bottles at hand that were hitting the rails in front of them.  
  
"OFFENSE! OFFENSE! OFFENSE", screamed Haruko and her two friends besides them, all of them jumping up and down from their uncontained excitement.  
  
"Sakuragi over here!", yelled Sendoh above the noise level of the court, waving his arms out to catch Sakuragi's attention but he was being blocked off roughly, borderline foul style by Fukatsu who still had his calm and collected expression on him.  
  
"AKAGE SARU! I'M OPEN. I'M OPEN!", yelled Kyota jumping up and down and who was not far away from him.  
  
"CHIKUSO!", yelled Sakuragi in confusion and in frustration at the solid block of wall that was blocking him, namely Sawakita.  
  
Which meant a certain raven head was on the loose but the red head didn't notice that because he was still busy trying to get away from the persistent top player that remained stuck on his path.  
  
"CHIKUSO!",yelled Sakuragi again in frustration after five seconds had passed and he was still nowhere near the net or even passing the ball to anyone else.  
  
"SAKURAGI! NANI YATTENDE?! YAROU! YOUR TEN SECONDS ARE ALMOST UP!", roared his Shohoku teammmates from the bench area throwing curse words at him.  
  
"CHIKUSO!", yelled Sakuragi again for the third time. He felt like going over there at his team's bench area and head butt both Miyagi and Mitsui off to hell but he knew that was not going to happen.  
  
The crowd chanted the count down then...  
  
"5.."  
  
'SHIT!'. A bead of sweat trickled down his forehead as he felt himself being compressed even more by the invisible walls of pressure that surrounded him.  
  
"4.."  
  
Sakuragi looked desperately around him. None of his teammates were within reach and if it was possible, Sawakita made his defense wall even more tight and impossible to break.  
  
'SHIT!'.  
  
"3.."  
  
He closed his eyes then trying to calm himself down. However, it was easier said then done. Grinding his teeth together in a death crunch thoughts of every kind possible stumbled through his mind one after another but none of them were calming him down.  
  
Then..  
  
"How about you, Sakuragi-kun? Why are you here?", he heard a familiar voice in his head said. It sounded vague and dim but it was loud enough for Sakuragi to hear through his jumbled thoughts.  
  
It was then that he realised that that voice belonged to his respected coach, Anzai Sensei.  
  
The thought was then followed by his own voice. "Nanda yo, Oya-ji. Tensai Basketman Hanamichi Sakuragi's here to kick some butt and conquer the world of baskteball!".  
  
Then he remebered something after that..  
  
~FLASHBACK~  
  
Shooting a pointed glare at Rukawa who pointedly gave him no heed then added. "And I *will* become the #1 basketball player in the world!".  
  
~END OF FLASHBACK~  
  
But then another voice went through his mind.. a voice that he was also familiar with..  
  
~FLASHBACK~  
  
Rukawa rolled his eyes at that and said, "That is not going to happen, do'aho".  
  
"TEMME! You think this TENSAI can't do it?", yelled Sakuragi angrily at his rival.  
  
Rukawa gave away the slightest of smirks, "You'd have to beat me first, do'aho".  
  
~END OF FLASHBACK~  
  
'Ah, that's right', thought Sakuragi to himself as he jerked his eyes open as the crowd shouted out that he only had 2 seconds left in possession of the ball.  
  
He levelled his eyes with Sawakita's then, new found determination gleamed inside of them.  
  
'I have to beat that kitsune off first before I could even think of giving up!', yelled Sakuragi inwardly.  
  
Then without warning, Sakuragi jabbed an index finger rudely infront of Sawakita's taken aback face.   
  
"OREWA TENSAI BASKETMAN SAKURAGI HANAMICHI!", said Sakuragi into his face, his infamous grin already forming on his face. "Remember that because I AM GOING TO BE THE N0#1 PLAYER IN THE BASKETBALL WORLD!".  
  
With one second away from allowing him to be in possession of the ball, he suddenly sidestepped Sawakita in a blur and completely broke Sawakita's iron wall of defense.  
  
"What..", said Sawakita turining to stop Sakuragi but he was too late. Sakuragi was already off!  
  
This time it was Sawakita's turn to curse. "KUSO!".  
  
"SENDOH!", yelled Sakuragi as his time was about to be up and he threw the ball at the spiky haired player.  
  
His throw was so fast and so powerful that he almost missed catching the ball but he caught it, though just barely. Besides, there was no way in hell that he would give a chance for Fukatsu, who was guarding him like stubborn persistent overgrown vines, to get it. He had enough of the powerful player pressurizing the hell out of him.  
  
The minute the ball was in his possession, he immediately threw it at his side to...  
  
Rukawa!  
  
"NANI?!", yelled Sakuragi, pissed as hell. His earlier efforts were back in the hands of his rival!  
  
Everyone ignored the pissed Sakuragi who was now yelling obscenities at Sendoh first then at Rukawa, all the while stomping his foot repeatedly onto the ground.  
  
Rukawa who suddenly decided to appear onto the schene out of nowhere, focused onto the schene around him (excluding the still pissed and stomping Sakuragi) and assessed his surroundings.  
  
Two guards were on him now. Apparently, both Sawakita and Fukatsu wasn't planning to get easy on him.  
  
But that was not a problem.  
  
The edge of Rukawa's lips curved a bit in what could have been a smile. It wasn't a Mr Nice guy smile, however.   
  
No.  
  
It was a smile that showed that he loved the challenge presented before him.   
  
After all, he was being given the honour of being guarded by two of the best players the nation had ever seen.  
  
And he was not going to back down from it.  
  
~FLASHBACK~  
  
Anzai sensei just smiled and repeated. "Why are you here, Rukawa-kun?".  
  
Anzai looked expectantly at his student for his answer.  
  
It was a while before Rukawa answered slowly almost muttering to himself, "I *will* become the #1 player in Japan".  
  
~END OF FLASHBACK~  
  
'N0#1 player', thought Rukawa, giving both guards in front of him a levelly cool but expressionless look.   
  
He smiled inwardly just then and gave Sawakita a pointed look.   
  
Rukawa held up a single finger in front of him while still dribbling the other ball in his other hand.  
  
"This is me", said Rukawa, coolly, his lips slightly half curved which could have been a smile but wasn't and said, "I am going to be the NUMBER 1".  
  
This time Sawakita was not taken aback by his action and in fact was grinning at the insolence and arrogance of the 'kid' in front of him. However, he didn't take him lightly on it because, even though Rukawa was only a year younger than him, his skills and talent was, admittedly, on par with him.  
  
And Fukatsu, being the calm and cool point guard that earned him the title of the no#1 point guard in the nation, didn't give out any sort of reaction and in fact was the first person to notice the careless opening that Rukawa had made.  
  
Seeing his chance, Fukatsu acted on it.  
  
He lunged for the ball in front of him and was about to steal it away from Rukawa's possession when he found himself ploughing into thin air instead.  
  
The ball along with Rukawa was nowhere in his sight.  
  
"What the..", said Fukatsu, baffled. He immediately turned to his side where Sawakita had stood beside him but only to find him already running off almost neck to neck with Rukawa who was dribbling the ball skillfully under one hand.   
  
Seeing that Akagi had his hands full under the net with Kawata and his little brother, Mikio Kawata, and Kyota and Sendoh was nowhere the net, he took his chance.  
  
Abruptly, Rukawa stopped in his tracks and immdiately jumped and executed a high arc jump shot. Screeching to a halt in front of Rukawa, Sawakita jumped twice as high as Rukawa did but the ball was too high for him to reach.   
  
Seeing that he wasn't getting anywhere near to the ball, Sawakita cursed under his breathe and immediately opted to land onto the ground and headed for the rebound instead.  
  
Rukawa who refused to be left behind, ran after him, preventing him as much as possible from getting anywhere near the ball which was now heading towards the hoop.  
  
Just then when it was surely that the ball was going to go through the hoop, a sudden yell erupted followed by a blurred swipe on the ball with a massive and loud 'bang!'.   
  
"'STEAMBOAT' block!", roared Kawata, his infamous block made the ball zoom in an orange miniature meterorite heading towards the ground and away from the hoop.  
  
Groans and cheers erupted through the crowd but a second later it was crushed by the sounds of cheers for the Akita Shoten team player who had made the incredible move.  
  
"KAWATA! KAWATA! KAWATA!", yelled the crowd, cheering for the no#1 centre player of the nation.  
  
But then..  
  
"EAT THIS KING KONG!", yelled an orange figure, seemingly apearing out of nowhere, caught the orange meterorite against his hand and heading staright for the hoop!  
  
"TENSAI BASKETMAN SAKURAGI HANAMICHI, SLAM DUNK-O!", shouted Sakuragi in a near roar as he gave an almighty dunk.  
  
WHAM! The ball went through the net.  
  
And like a dream put in slow motion, the ball swished through the net and Sakuragi slide off the ring of the hoop towards the ground with the ball landing with a 'thud' on the floor next to him.  
  
The faces around him, including Kawata who was seriously in need of repairing his loose jaw, were that of shock and disbelief at the sudden turn of events and could not believe their eyes at just who had made that possible.  
  
If anyone had made that shot, perhaps it wouldn't have been as shocking to them but this was not just anyone. This was Sakuragi, a beginner, for crying out loud and one who was well known for his lousy shots be it dunk, lay up or whatever shots he's capable of doing. Besides that, he had caught the ball right after Kawata's powerful 'Steamboat block' attack. And also besdies THAT no one had anticipated that Kawata was going to use THAT attack in the first place.  
  
Sakuragi seemed oblivious at the sudden silence around him. He just wiped off the sweat on his forehead with the back of his hand and ran off to the other side of the court yelling behind his back, "BALL'S NOW ON THE OTHER TEAM! LET'S GO, MINNA!".  
  
At that everyone snapped off from their shock, with the players all running to their respective positions and resuming back to defense and offense modewhile the crowd resumed to their cheering.  
  
Only this time, the cheering of the crowd consisted of both of the teams' name.  
  
+++  
  
TBC...  
  
Phew! This is one's hell of a long chapter. In fact it's suppose to be longer than this but ... I'm not going to make it any longer and that's that. ^_^;  
  
BTW, do you think that either Sakuragi or Rukawa was sort of 'OOC?' (out of character?). If you think so, can you please tell me and point out which part that OOC was in. It's so that I can do about it later if neccessary. THANKS!  
  
See ya in later chapters! 


	8. 08: Anzai sensei's conclusion is

To reviewer: anime_luverjc(), wah, I made you cry? hn... I didn't realize that this fic that i wrote could make anyone cry, touched maybe (uh wait, isn't that like basically the same thing?) ^^; . Nah... it's not weird. Not really anyway since I know what you mean. Anyways, thanks for taking your time to review and reading this fic! Hope to hear your opinion next time.. in later chaps. Ja ne! And once again Doumo arrigato gozaimasu! ^_^  
  
Disclaimers: Slam Dunk belongs to Takehiko Inoue sensei. I, on the other hand, own nothing except for this fanfic ^^;  
  
A/N: This is NON-YAOI. Story takes place after Shohoku's match against Sannoh. Their match against Sannoh can be found in the last six volumes of SD.  
  
Btw, warning: language (ok maybe not serious but yeah know, just in case)   
  
Contact me: yuki_ne@hotmail.com. (I won't bite ^^)  
  
Chapter editted and rechecked by shiyuchiyuki  
  
Some parts from the previous chapter i.e.   
  
07: The start of a heated battle  
  
~~~~~~~~~  
  
"CHIKUSO!",yelled Sakuragi again in frustration after five seconds had passed and he was still nowhere near the net or even passing the ball to anyone else.  
  
"SAKURAGI! NANI YATTENDE?! YAROU! YOUR TEN SECONDS ARE ALMOST UP!", roared his Shohoku teammmates from the bench area throwing curse words at him.  
  
"CHIKUSO!", yelled Sakuragi again for the third time. He felt like going over there at his team's bench area and head butt both Miyagi and Mitsui off to hell but he knew that was not going to happen.  
  
The crowd chanted the count down then...  
  
"5.."  
  
'SHIT!'. A bead of sweat trickled down his forehead as he felt himself being compressed even more by the invisible walls of pressure that surrounded him.  
  
"4.."  
  
Sakuragi looked desperately around him. None of his teammates were within reach and if it was possible, Sawakita made his defense wall even more tight and impossible to break.  
  
'SHIT!'.  
  
"3.."  
  
He closed his eyes then trying to calm himself down. However, it was easier said then done. Grinding his teeth together in a death crunch thoughts of every kind possible stumbled through his mind one after another but none of them were calming him down.  
  
Then..  
  
"How about you, Sakuragi-kun? Why are you here?", he heard a familiar voice in his head said. It sounded vague and dim but it was loud enough for Sakuragi to hear through his jumbled thoughts.  
  
It was then that he realised that that voice belonged to his respected coach, Anzai Sensei.  
  
The thought was then followed by his own voice. "Nanda yo, Oya-ji. Tensai Basketman Hanamichi Sakuragi's here to kick some butt and conquer the world of baskteball!".  
  
Then he remebered something after that..  
  
~FLASHBACK~  
  
Shooting a pointed glare at Rukawa who pointedly gave him no heed then added. "And I *will* become the #1 basketball player in the world!".  
  
~END OF FLASHBACK~  
  
But then another voice went through his mind.. a voice that he was also familiar with..  
  
~FLASHBACK~  
  
Rukawa rolled his eyes at that and said, "That is not going to happen, do'aho".  
  
"TEMME! You think this TENSAI can't do it?", yelled Sakuragi angrily at his rival.  
  
Rukawa gave away the slightest of smirks, "You'd have to beat me first, do'aho".  
  
~END OF FLASHBACK~  
  
'Ah, that's right', thought Sakuragi to himself as he jerked his eyes open as the crowd shouted out that he only had 2 seconds left in possession of the ball.  
  
He levelled his eyes with Sawakita's then, new found determination gleamed inside of them.  
  
'I have to beat that kitsune off first before I could even think of giving up!', yelled Sakuragi inwardly.  
  
Then without warning, Sakuragi jabbed an index finger rudely infront of Sawakita's taken aback face.   
  
"OREWA TENSAI BASKETMAN SAKURAGI HANAMICHI!", said Sakuragi into his face, his infamous grin already forming on his face. "Remember that because I AM GOING TO BE THE N0#1 PLAYER IN THE BASKETBALL WORLD!".  
  
~~~~~~~~~  
  
08: Anzai sensei's conclusion is...?  
  
One minute then two minutes have passed..  
  
And despite his slam dunk shot earlier on which had brought their team's score at least a bit closer to their opponent's, they were still relatively getting nowhere near anywhere to defeating the Akita Shoten team.  
  
Or even remotely having the possibility of defeating them for that matter.  
  
Because now, with 3 minutes already gone from the nine minutes that they last had their time out, the score difference was now getting further and further apart and out of reach.  
  
It was 69 (Kanagawa) to 106 (Akita Shoten)  
  
And a certain red head was seriously pissed.  
  
However, he was not the only one.  
  
+++  
  
"I can't believe I actually felt threatened by your skills the last time we had a match together", spoke up the black haired, egg head in front of him, namely the no#9 jersey Sannoh player, Sawakita Eiji.  
  
Rukawa who facing him as a guard pointedly ignored him, while reigning him on a tight defensive wall so that he couldn't escape easily from his current position.  
  
Seeing that the black haired player, in front of him had no intention of replying anytime soon Sawakita gave off the slightest of smirks. "Planning to abandon your plan to visit the US already?".  
  
That in itself was stepping out of the line and he knew it.  
  
It was a while before Sawakita finally got an answer from the raven haried player in front of him.  
  
Rukawa just slightly raised an eyebrow at him.  
  
So ok maybe his answer was not in the verbal context but it was still an answer if not a reaction of some sort.  
  
Out of the corner of his eyes, Rukawa could just barely see Sendoh matching up with Fukatsu refusing to let the other point guard go and have his way while a certain black haired monkey was vainly trying to keep his mark in place but was failing miserably. Akagi who was in his line of vision were being wrestled by the other centre, Kawata though not outwardly since that would catch the attention of the refrees and calling out some sort of foul. He frowned slightly then noticing then that a certain red head was missing. He spotted Mikio Kawata not far away next to where Kawata and Akagi stood, noting that the tall and thick bodied player was left free and unguarded.  
  
'Where the hell did that do'aho go?', thought Rukawa, irritation creased his black eyebrows.  
  
Mistaking this as some sort of another answer to his earlier question, Sawakita immediately took upon it as a crack in the otherwise solid wall of confidence that surrounded the raven haired player.  
  
Remembering the last time when Rukawa told him of his plan to go to the US after defeating him from their last match together at Inter-High right after defeating his team, Sawakita now openly smirked. "Remember your words in our last match?".  
  
When Sawakita was sure that he had at least most of his attention, he continued the smirk still in place, "That was all talk, wasn't it? All talk and no substance. But that's ok..".  
  
Rukawa's eyebrow went up a notch at that.  
  
"... after all, no matter how highly you think of your playing skills or how people look upon highly on you because of it, one thing still remains as a solid fact", said Sawakita, a mocking grin forming on his face.   
  
Rukawa's eyes slightly narrowed at this before the other player continued.  
  
Jerking his thumb towards himself, he said, "I am still the #1 player while you..". The player nodded his heads toward him. "Are still too green to even think of threatening me".  
  
Rukawa who was getting seriously pissed at every word spoken out of the other player's mouth opposite him, made an invisble effort to hold back his murderous intent of beating him right then and there and turning him into sushi. In fact, Rukawa had somehow managed to give off a cool shrug instead and said through cool and calm eyes that hid his murderous intent. "Think whatever you will because..".  
  
He saw the flciker of his opponents eye then.  
  
Sawakita made a quick jump to his side then, his arms outstretched and hand high up to receive the ball...  
  
But Rukawa was too fast for him and took the ball right away from Sawakita's near grasp.  
  
Before Rukawa landed either of his feet back to the ground, he gave Sawakita a cool look that could freeze boiling water and said in a low voice enough so that Sawakita could hear.   
  
He continued whatever he meant to say to the other player earlier as if nothing had happened.  
  
"...I'll make you regret you ever said those words to ME".  
  
+++  
  
Sakuragi was still in his pissed mood. He was so pissed that he wasn't concentrating on the game and was visibly falling behind from the teamwork.  
  
If the red head had noticed this, he didn't give any sign that he did but a lot of people certainly had.  
  
"What is wrong with Sakuragi-kun?", said Haruko who was the first to speak out what was all in everyone's mind.  
  
Youhei who stood beside her heard her and the worry in her voice. He himself was asking the same question to himself for three times now but still hadn't come up with an answer.   
  
"Wakaranai (i don't know), Haruko-san", said Youhei but tried to appease the growing worry that visibly showed on the girl's face.   
  
"Daijoubu (it's alright), Haruko-san. Whatever is bothering him, he'll come out of it soon enough. If we know Sakuragi, he's maybe just thinking up a counter plan to reverse the game". Even as he said this, Youhei highly doubted that the red head was actually even thinking along that line of thought.  
  
"Ah, so desu (ah, that's right)", said Haruko the worry lessened a bit and she turned to give a small smile at the tall boy next to her. "I forget that Sakuragi-kun is a tensai after all and a sugoi (great) player".  
  
  
  
Youhei smiled back weakly at her and only replied back an "ah".  
  
Both of them turned back to watch the game but the worry still visibly etched on their faces.  
  
+++  
  
"WHAT THE HELL WAS THAT?", Miyagi nearly yelled his head off when Sakuragi missed the rebound for the third time in a row and let the other team get away with the ball. "NANI YATTENDE, HANAMICHI?! SNAP OUT OF IT AND GET THAT BALL!".  
  
Grumbling and throwing foul word after foul word at the red head, Miyagi sat back down heavily on the bench with a "Hmph" and pour himself with water to cool his head off.  
  
Mitsui who sat next to him and grinding his teeth one way or another with his mind thinking up every foul word he could think of to curse the Akita Shoten team and at Sakuragi who was not making things any better, said through clenched teeth. "What the hell do you think is wrong with that IDOT?", he asked the shorter boy beside him who was still cooling his head off with the bottle of water in his hands.  
  
Snapping his eyes open which were shut earlier, Miyagi turned to glare at the player in question and said, "Whatever it is, he had better snap out of it. Though he is an idiot and not very reliable to count on we can't have one man short in the team".  
  
"Besides", he continued as he wiped his forehead with the towel that was draped over his shoulders. "The rest of our team member players are either practically dead or can't match up with those guys". He jerked his thumb towards the Akita Shoten team bench area, clearly refering to them.   
  
"Yeah, you're right. Besides that", said Mitsui, frowning at the red head who had yet again made a careless move. "The kid (refering to Sakuragi) has that damn stamina of his which is scary enough if he puts it to good use". The last few words were uttered in a dry tone.  
  
Miyagi nodded his head in agreement but was distracted when he saw something pissed him off.  
  
Mitsui saw it too.  
  
"DAMMIT! NANI YATTENDE SAKURAGI HANAMICHI?! MIND ON THE GAME!", both of them yelled springing up from their seats abruptly and waving their fists threateningly at Sakuragi.  
  
Maki, Jin, Fujima, Hanagata, Fukuda and Uozumi who were closest to them had heard the exchange earlier on and were now shaking their heads.   
  
'This is going to be a long game', came through the thought to each and everyone of the players' mind.  
  
+++  
  
Takato sensei was in danger of splitting his own paper fan into two as his temper and impatience rose rapidly at the poor performance that their Kanagawa team were displaying. Even Sendoh and Rukawa whom he looked highly upon and respected as very talented and skilled young players were not doing well and neither of them were playing on top notch as they usually did.  
  
Taoka sensei, on the other hand, had no trouble of letting his full fledged temper on the loose. Way loose.  
  
In fact, he was so angry and so rung out of patience that he had to be restrained by four of the Kanagawa team members from letting him run into court and murder some of their still playing players.  
  
"SENDOH! YOU IDIOT! NANI YATTENDE?! KILL THAT PLAYER IN FRONT OF YOU! YOU'RE NOT EVEN IN YOUR 100% FULL POWER, YOU IDOT! GET SERIOUS FOR ONCE IN YOUR LIFE!", raged Sendoh's coach from the bench area despite still being bodily restrained.   
  
Some of the judges and refrees could only stare at the outraged display that the coach were showing but Taoka sensei gave them no heed.   
  
"AND YOU!", the sensei continued to yell, pointing his hand towards Rukawa. "YOU'RE ALSO NOT PLAYING SERIOUSLY! GET SERIOUS!".  
  
The sensei continued to rage on each and every one of the players on court but Takato sensei just shook his head and tuned off the other sensei's outraged yells. He made no effort of calming the other sensei down since he needed all the energy to calm *himself* down.  
  
Takato sensei took a deep breathe, relaxed his tight hold on his fan and closed his eyes then at the same time letting out the air he had held earlier.  
  
It was then he heard someone made a slurpping noise beside him.  
  
Snapping his eyes back open, he just remembered who was sitting not far away next to him. Surely enough, when he turned around he saw that the white haired sensei of the Shohoku team were having a fine time drinking a steamy herbal tea.   
  
What struck the attention of Takato sensei's was not of the other sensei's steamy herbal tea, however.  
  
It was the smile and the content look on Anzai sensei's face which was so opposite of that of Toaka sensei's and himself were feeling right then.  
  
Frowning at this, an unwanted thought found itself going through his head then. However, deteremined to proof this thought false, he decided to put it in question to the white haired sensei.  
  
"Anzai sensei", said Takato sensei triyng to catch the other sensei's attention. When the other sensei looked up at him questioningly, he asked what was no doubt in everyone's mind whether they be the spectators above them or the ones around them. "Do you think we have a chance of winning against the opponent?".  
  
At this, Anzai sensei's glasses seemed to flash and it took a while before he gave out his reply.  
  
When he did two pairs of eyes watched him, with Taoka sensei finally at least having calmed down for the moment and just in time to hear what the other sensei have to say, smile at them. A smile that was not creased with worry. "Ah. That is a good question, Takato-kun".  
  
Before he continued, he made a show of sipping his herbal tea first.  
  
Then said to the two agitated coaches, "However, you shouldn't have put that question to me, Takato-kun".  
  
At that, both senseis raised their eyebrows.   
  
Setting his tea slowly back to the small tea plate in his hand he continued, "The people you should really have put the question to should be the players here..", he said looking towards the players who were on the bench and who were yelling either their support or groans of despair or just quietly watching the game without comment. " Shouste (and)..", he looked over at their players on court. "..most importantly our players over there".  
  
Both senseis again frowned at this. Taoka sensei who had missed the question that Takato sensei had asked earlier on nevertheless was catching up and guessing what the white haired sensei was talking about.  
  
"So you're saying that our team really doesn't have a chance of winning", said Taoka sensei through gritted teeth, saying that as a fact and not a question. But he himself refused to believe what he had said to be true but at the same time knowing that it was true.  
  
Takato sensei sighed then, slowly opening his fan and fanned himself. There was a slight downcast to the way his shoulders hunched as if ready to accept the reality of defeat for the team. "Souka..".  
  
It was then that the infamous trademark chuckle escaped the white haired sensei's lips.   
  
Snapping to attention at this, both Takato and Taoka sensei turned their attentions back to him.  
  
"Winning.. ka?", he continued on chuckling before finally answering both of the other senseis question.   
  
"Remember, Takato-kun shouste (and) Taoka-kun", the sensei said with a smile. "Our boys are strong. We only have to believe in them..".  
  
He made a small gesture towards the players on the bench and in front of him.   
  
His eyes gleamed then followed by his silent but confident smile.   
  
Then..  
  
"..to know that they will win".  
  
+++  
  
TBC...  
  
Short chapter but never mind...   
  
Hn. Actually to tell you the truth I'm not sure whether they really can win or not.. so ok I'm the one writing this fic but... hish.. I'm spinning myself into a fine headache. The difference in score is like what? about 40 or something? Could anyone shorten that difference as humanly possible or what? To top it all off, the time is like what about five minutes?   
  
Headache.. headache... @_@;  
  
Reviews is always appreciated! ^.^  
  
C u in later chapters, Ja ne! 


	9. 09: The start of a comeback: YOU ARE GOI...

To reviewers:  
  
roselle() - thanks for saying that this fic's cool! ^^. Btw, I followed your advice and changed the fic's summary... I'm really so not good at them but never mind. So what do you think of it? If you think that it's still not so and so please do tell me. THANKS! ^^ (Doumo also for reading this fic)  
  
-R- - thanks for reading this fic! ^^. Hn. Yeah, well, about who's gonna win... uh... after at most 2 chaps you'll know who'll win... and so will I (-_-;) for that matter.  
  
ALL readers: Doumo Arrigato gozaimasu for reading this far (=^_^=)!  
  
Disclaimers: Slam Dunk belongs to Takehiko Inoue sensei. I, on the other hand, own nothing except for this fanfic and the star combi's my idea^^;  
  
A/N: This is NON-YAOI. Story takes place after Shohoku's match against Sannoh. Their match against Sannoh can be found in the last six volumes of SD.  
  
Btw, warning: language (ok maybe not serious but yeah know, just in case)  
  
This fic had been checked and edited by shiyuchiyuki on 3/15/2004 1:43 PM  
  
~~~~~  
  
Some parts from the previous chapter i.e.  
  
08: Anzai sensei's conclusion is...?  
  
"So you're saying that our team really doesn't have a chance of winning", said Taoka sensei through gritted teeth, saying that as a fact and not a question. But he himself refused to believe what he had said to be true but at the same time knowing that it was true.  
  
Takato sensei sighed then, slowly opening his fan and fanned his face. There was a slight downcast to the way his shoulders hunched as if ready to accept the reality of defeat for the team. "Souka..".  
  
It was then that the infamous trademark chuckle escaped the white haired sensei's lips.  
  
Snapping to attention at this, both Takato and Taoka sensei turned their attentions back to him.  
  
"Winning.. ka?", he continued on chuckling before finally answering both of the other senseis question.  
  
"Remember, Takato-kun shouste (and) Taoka-kun", the sensei said with a smile. "Our boys are strong. We only have to believe in them..".  
  
He made a small gesture towards the players on the bench and in front of him.  
  
His eyes gleamed then followed by his silent but confident smile.  
  
Then..  
  
"..to know that they will win".  
  
~~~~~~  
  
09: The start of a comeback: YOU ARE GOING DOWN!  
  
Rukawa, Akagi, Sendoh and Kyota simultaneously glanced at the scoreboard and at the ticking clock.  
  
6 minutes to go.  
  
Not good.  
  
69 (Kanagawa) to 109 (Akita)  
  
40 points difference.  
  
THAT is SO not good.  
  
One question kept hovering over their heads..  
  
Can they win?  
  
+++  
  
Sakuragi's pissed mood was slowly deflating and something else was slowly replacing it. It was the unfamiliar weight of hopelessness, knowing that their defeat was inevitable.  
  
The Akita team was just too strong for them and everybody knew it including the self proclaimed tensai himself.  
  
As soon as the negative thought rammed through his thick head, Sakuragi furiously shook his head refusing to believe that such a thought had actually entered his tensai mind.  
  
When the thought kept coming back at him again and again refusing to get out of his mind, Sakuragi couldn't take it anymore.  
  
Quick as lightning, he brought his head slamming onto the floor with a resounding big 'BANG!'.  
  
Everyone on the court who were still in the middle of the game and was still playing, abruptly froze, apparently, startled at the explosion that they had just heard. Even the audience visibly quieted down at the still echoing 'bang'.  
  
Everyone turned to the source of the explosion, their eyes wide open and jaws loose on the ground save for a certain raven head who just puffed out a sigh and a certain white haired man who was leisurely sipping his cup of herbal tea.  
  
"Head butted himself..", muttered Kyota, who like the rest of the Kanagawa team members should have gotten used to Sakuragi's eccentric behavior but haven't, shook his head as if didn't understand why the hell he was stuck in the same team with the red head and said, "..yet again".  
  
However, Kyota had to admit he was rather relieved that Sakuragi had done that because it only meant that Sakuragi was about to be back to his own reckless self and not the quiet and zoned out state he was currently in.  
  
Sendoh, who also had snapped out from his stunned state, slowly grinned then. His usual sparkle of amusement seeping back into his eyes, amused at one of Sakuragi's yet astonishing if not crazy antics.  
  
'Mah. Our Sakuragi Hanamichi's back', he thought with a definite grin, his earlier tensed and fidgeting stance slowly relaxing a little bit.  
  
Akagi who just shook his head at the red head thought, 'Baka yarou' but a small smile could be seen at the edge of his lips, remembering and knowing that Sakuragi had head butted himself in order to calm himself down and to come back into focus of the game. It was the red head's infamous way to get his head back in a game.  
  
Seeing that the game was still frozen at the moment, Rukawa ignored Sawakita who had a 'what-the-hell-is-wrong-with-that-guy' look and walked over towards Sakuragi who still had his head bent down but was far enough away off the ground. Smoke practically came out in wisps from his forehead where he had hit himself and where a red hill was slowly forming itself there.  
  
"Nani yattende, do'aho", said Rukawa, in that low and cool voice of his.  
  
Upon hearing the all too familiar voice of the kitsune, Sakuragi snapped his head up and glared at Rukawa. "Nandato!", he growled instead of his usual angry shouts and yells.  
  
Noticing this slight, Rukawa frowned. Then..  
  
Rukawa made a gesture of tapping a finger on his forehead and then jerked a thumb towards the red head. "Feeling any better?".  
  
Sakuragi glowered at him and said, "What's your point, kitsune?".  
  
Rukawa half smiled then, one that held no mirth in it. His eyes then became hard and serious. He jerked a thumb at the scoreboard and slightly inclined his head towards the opponent's team. "5 minutes, 40 points difference. Think you can catch up with me?".  
  
Sakuragi stared at him then before an understanding dawned in his eyes and his infamous grin slowly forming back on his face. "You actually think I'm going to work with you?".  
  
Rukawa just shrugged. "Nobody said about working together".  
  
Sakuragi just grinned. "Hah. Even so there's no chance in HELL I'll be working with you".  
  
"Exactly", said Rukawa, for once agreeing out loud with the red head.  
  
If possible, Sakuragi's grin widened even further. "But I'm going to kick your ass and I am going to be the one to close that difference up. Not YOU. See if I don't!".  
  
Rukawa just puffed out a sigh and shrugged his declaration off.  
  
"NANI?!", yelled Sakuragi at Rukawa's indifference clearly back to his usual shouting and yelling acts.  
  
The whistle of the referee blew right then. "Oi! What are you two doing?", yelled one of the referees jogging up to them. "We're still in the middle of a game. The both of you are to refrain from talking again. If you continue to do so and disrupt this game both of you are disqualified and out of here you got that?", continued the referee in a firm voice and stern expression.  
  
Rukawa just shrugged while Sakuragi tried to restrain himself from glaring too much at the referee but he remained seethingly silent.  
  
Taking their reactions as a yes, the referee told them to get to their positions before blowing the whistle off to restart the game back to its pace.  
  
Before both of them separated to their respective places, Sakuragi called out at Rukawa, "Oi, kitsune!".  
  
Rukawa half turned at him, giving him his usual cool look.  
  
Sakuragi then grinned at him then, one that challenged him. He held up one finger then showed off all of his five fingers before jerking his thumb towards the scoreboard. "One minute, 5 points. Think you can do it?".  
  
Rukawa raised an eyebrow as a passing interest flickered through his blue eyes. "Is that a challenge?"  
  
Sakuragi's grin widened.  
  
Rukawa held up a finger before showing a ball of fist at him. "I can do it with 10 points in 1 minute".  
  
It was Sakuragi's turn to scoff. "Ceh. All talk, kitsune. If you can do that, you could have done that ages ago in this game".  
  
Sakuragi's word hit a nerve in him but Rukawa didn't show it however it still showed in the next words he uttered.  
  
"You're on".  
  
+++  
  
All the Kanagawa team members including Taoka sensei and Takato sensei, save for Anzai sensei, had either their jaws dropped open or their eyes popping out of their heads.  
  
Because right after the game restarted back on course, the pace of almost immediately reversed...  
  
To their side!  
  
Sure they were still way behind in terms of the difference in scores but...  
  
The score was now 77 (Kanagawa) to 109 (Akita).  
  
With Rukawa scoring five points and Sakuragi scoring the rest of the three points.  
  
But what was mind boggling was the fact that they had scored those points right under one minute!  
  
"What in hell happened to them?", said a stunned Miyagi, plopping back into his seat after yelling an 'ALRIGHT!' as Sakuragi made it with his given chance of a free one throw.  
  
Mitsui who also looked stunned but mixed with amazement in his expression said, "Whatever it is, I'm glad it happened".  
  
"It must have been something to do with the exchange that both of them (Sakuragi and Rukawa) had earlier on", said Maki who was two players away from Mitsui and Miyagi.  
  
Mitsui and Miyagi heard this and nodded together before contradicting themselves as they shook their heads instead.  
  
Jin who heard this just smiled and said, "I'm just glad that they're finally putting their differences aside and getting along fine with each other".  
  
Both Shohoku members stared at Jin after making that comment.  
  
'Nai. Nai', thought both Shohoku members again shaking their heads at the incredulous comment.  
  
Both Shohoku members turned back to watch the game when...  
  
"HOLY SHIT!", yelled both Miyagi and Mitsui jumping out form their seats in a near stumble as they yelled in disbelief and shock.  
  
They had only their eyes off the game in those few seconds and already the score was unbelievable!  
  
It was now 82 (Kanagawa) to 109 (Akita)!  
  
"HOW IN HELL DID THAT HAPPEN?!" yelled both Shohoku members still disbelieving.  
  
No one bothered to answer them as they were too busy trying to comprehend what the hell was going on.  
  
Not that what was happening was not a good thing.  
  
Not far away from them, two wide eyed senseis couldn't believe at the speed that their team was gaining to get the upper hand of the game. Especially of the two players that made it possible.  
  
However, a certain white haired man just a few seats next to them just chuckled and said to no one in particularly.  
  
"The real deal has yet to start".  
  
+++  
  
"WOH!", cried Takamiya, who was back in the stands with the other Sakuragi gundam members. Like everyone else there, he was shocked by the turned of events but also at the same time excited to no end. "YOSH, HANAMICHI! GANBATTE YO! OFFENSE! OFFENSE! OFEENSE!", yelled Takamiya along with Okusu, the blond member and Noma, the other black haired member of Sakuragi's gundam as all three banged their empty soda bottles on the railings in front of them as loudly and as noisily as possible.  
  
Youhei, who was relieved that Sakuragi was back to normal, just grinned and shook his head at the reversed pace of the game and at his red head friend, amazed also at the turn of events.  
  
Haruko who was also relieved was back to screaming her support along with her two other friends, happy that her close friend was back to himself.  
  
+++  
  
"How was that, kitsune?", yelled Sakuragi, after he brought a slammin' dunk through the opponent's hoop, earning yet two points for their team.  
  
Both of them were racing back neck to neck to their territory ready to defend it.  
  
"Child's play", muttered the raven head player, in his usual low voice but Sakuragi heard it.  
  
"NANDATO!" said Sakuragi. "Child's play my ass!"  
  
With that he zoomed towards the player who had the ball in hand, namely Fukatsu, paying no heed to guard Mikio Kawata whom he was supposed to guard.  
  
Under fire, Rukawa refused to be left behind and went after him almost forgetting that he was supposed to guard Sawakita who was running neck to neck with him.  
  
Fukatsu, who saw the three incoming players, widened his eyes in reaction. Sendoh who saw this took the opportunity to take advantage of his opponent's distraction and slapped the ball out of his hands.  
  
The minute Sendoh had the ball in his possession, he slipped past Fukatsu, who just realized the mistake he had made, and yelled to his Kanagawa teammates, "SOKKO (fast break), MINNA!"  
  
"HOH!" they yelled in response, as they zoomed down the other side of the court.  
  
Two particular players were already ahead of the rest of the players and Sendoh took the opportunity to pass the ball to one of them.  
  
Sendoh held the ball high up in the air in his hand while still on the run and threw it in full blast towards the player of his choice.  
  
"KITSUNE! TEMME!" yelled Sakuragi in outrage as Rukawa received Sendoh's pass easily.  
  
Screeching to a halt behind the three pointer line, Rukawa executed his three pointer shot.  
  
It was then and there that Sakuragi made an abrupt screech to a halt, frozen in his place as he watched the ball fly up into the air as if in slow motion and slowly falling back towards the net.  
  
A sense of dejavu suddenly flashed through him then, as if he had seen and felt something like this before..but where? when?  
  
It was then that he remembered the game that they had against the Aichi prefecture. The one that they had thought was going to be their last match until...  
  
~FLASHBACK~  
  
Sakuragi was barely aware of his surroundings, of the shouts and yells of his team mates, as he stepped behind a line which he was not aware of but at the same time unconsciously was. He raised his eyes to look at his target, the net, which seemed so far away and raised his arms in a high arc. Almost in a blur, with deadening calm, he let the ball fly away from his hands.  
  
2 seconds..  
  
Everyone stared at the ball which was flying high overhead them. It was so high that they wondered how the hell that was possible.  
  
1 second..  
  
The ball was falling.. falling so fast that it was a blur and looked like a meteorite about to crash on earth.  
  
It also looked like it had no chance of getting through the net.  
  
And everyone knew it.  
  
There was also the fact that the shooter was Sakuragi and everyone knew that he had never attempt a 3 pointer shot before much less learn it. It would take a miracle for the shot to go through.  
  
Even before anything happened, Rukawa was the first one to be shocked because...  
  
Zero second later..  
  
A miracle did happen.  
  
The ball *had* swished through the net.  
  
He had done it.  
  
~END OF FLASHBACK~  
  
Sakuragi blinked uncharacteristically as Rukawa's 3 pointer shoot whooshed through the net as his momentary flashback ended.  
  
Rukawa, who saw Sakuragi's current spaced out state, slightly raised an eyebrow at him.  
  
"Do'aho", said Rukawa, guessing what the red head was thinking.  
  
Upon hearing the kitsune's voice, Sakuragi snapped back to reality and looked a bit irritably at him.  
  
However, before Sakuragi could utter a word, Rukawa cut him off.  
  
Slightly raising his eyebrow a bit higher at him, Rukawa said, "Remembered something, do'aho?"  
  
Sakuragi who at first looked blankly at him and at the question he had asked before he slowly grinned, his infamous tensai grin.  
  
"Heh", said Sakuragi, if possible his grin went even wider. "That's not all that I've just remembered".  
  
He then looked up at the audience, seemed to search through them, stopped and then looked back at the raven head, a thumb jerking towards the direction that he had cast his sight earlier.  
  
"Still your word on that deal up?"  
  
Rukawa immediately frowned at that and looked at where Sakuragi's thumb was pointing.  
  
Then understood what the red head do'aho meant.  
  
Puffing out a sigh, Rukawa said, "Yare, yare. It looks like the #1 spot solely belongs to me then".  
  
"NANI?! WHAT THE HELL DID YOU MEAN BY THAT?!" burst out Sakuragi, swearing to god that he'd kill that kitsune someday but not right then.  
  
Rukawa just raised his eyebrow again, shrugged and walked off.  
  
But he said over his shoulder. "You do your part of the bargain too, do'aho".  
  
Sakuragi who had decided not to wait killing him right then stopped in his mid tracks.  
  
Sakuragi then went over to Rukawa and pounded him on the back, his tensai grin back on his face. "YOSH! But I'll NOT pass the ball to you".  
  
Rukawa, who was annoyed at him for pounding his back, shoved Sakuragi away from him but in response to his announcement, the raven head just puffed out a sigh and shrugged his shoulders indifferently.  
  
Rukawa looked up at the scoreboard then counting up the difference of scores and checked the time they still had left.  
  
'Under four minutes and we're still 24 points behind', thought Rukawa seriously getting pissed at how far behind in points there were.  
  
"Do'aho", said Rukawa then, stopping the red head from his tracks. "Don't let go of that rebound. I'll take care of the points".  
  
Staring at him incredulously at what he had said, Sakuragi was about to yell when he stopped and said with narrowed eyes, "Nanda yo, kitsune. The Rebound King wouldn't let go off it no matter what".  
  
Sakuragi jogged off then and went to mark Mikio and muttering under his breathe, ".. and I have absolutely no intention of letting you score all the points, kitsune".  
  
Somewhere off the two, a certain player heard their exchange and smiled.  
  
An indirect challenge was issued.  
  
And there was no way he was going to let that pass.  
  
+++  
  
Akagi was seriously getting pissed off at the oaf that was the King Kong duped player, Kawata, the centre on the opponent's side. Kawata was yet again mercilessly throwing taunts at him just to rile him up and force him to make a foul. But this was Akagi who knew how to restrain himself even though he was seriously thinking of bashing the bastard's head right then and there. It was no wonder that Uozumi though rivaled Akagi in terms of skills and techniques in playing as centre had lost his temper against the jack ass bastard who stood in front of him especially with that impatient and explosive temper that Uozumi was famous for. Akagi silently thanked god that he had more patience in him then he realized. Maybe it had been due to all of the patience he put through with Sakuragi's idiotic character and not to mention all the crazy things that the red head had a habit of doing.  
  
Like calling his former captain a gorilla for instance, the first time that they had met together at one morning in the Shohoku high school grounds.  
  
Speaking of which, that idiot sure as hell is playing his part in the game pretty well right then unlike himself. Another one of the things that was beginning to grate on Akagi's already dangerously thin nerves besides Kawata's persistent bullshit talk.  
  
The King Kong's skills in rebounding, defense and offense around the goal area was also not making his patience anywhere near anywhere good.  
  
It was no wonder that Kawata was the #1 centre player in the nation, what with his damnable great skills at playing his position AND pissing the hell of other people's head off.  
  
'FINE. If that's going to be the way it is. So be it', thought Akagi through a new found determination and through gritted gorilla teeth.  
  
Kawata, who was pushing Akagi from behind as both readied themselves for a rebound from Minoru's (the shooting guard of the Akita team) hurried jump shot, was about to jump off from the ground for the ball when Akagi pulled the end uniform shirt of Kawata's, (not visible to the referees/judges eyes or much of anyone for that matter) Sakuragi style (refer to volume #28 of SD manga), bringing the other player off balance.  
  
Feeling fired from all the crap talk from Kawata, Akagi roared, "TAKE THIS!", as he slammed the ball away from the goal area.  
  
Kawata who was trying to regain his balance on the ground just watched an orange blur going over them and straight for a black and spiky haired player.  
  
Realizing that he had been pulled from behind, Kawata glared at Akagi before shouting at the referee not far away from him, "REFREE! INTENTIONAL FOUL!". He waved his arm wildly at Akagi who was already on his way to the other side of the court.  
  
The referee was looking puzzled at his actions when a shout from the Akita coach blasted at Kawata. "KAWATA! NANI YATTENDE?! FALLBACK, FALLBACK! The ball's on the opponent's side!", yelled the normally calm and cool coach of Sannoh namely Doumoto, an almost older and mustached version of Sendoh though just a bit shorter in height.  
  
"AH, HELL", said Kawata racing back to the other side of the court in no time flat.  
  
And the battle between the two primates raise up a notch after that incident but Kanagawa's gorilla was beginning to get on a roll.  
  
+++  
  
Sendoh, who had seen Akagi's little trick, was laughing inwardly.  
  
'Didn't think Akagi was the sort of person who'd resort to those kinds of tricks', mused Sendoh, thinking that it was so much like something that Sakuragi would do instead of the Shohoku's former team captain.  
  
'Speaking of which', thought Sendoh his grin turning into a thoughtful frown as he scanned the area before him and passed Fukatsu's shoulders as he looked for an opening and a player for him to pass the ball at, 'At least now Akagi's less pressurized that he was before even if it is just a little bit', thought Sendoh looking at Akagi who now didn't look much annoyed and angered by whatever Kawata's saying at him.  
  
'On the other hand, Kyota's really in a bad state right now', thought Sendoh, noticing that the shorter player really had a hard time guarding the other team's shooting guard, Minoru. In addition to the other player's relatively higher frame than that of Kyota's, his skills were also of that of high quality Akita team style that Sendoh was all too familiar with. Apparently, the guard's skills weren't making Kyota's weariness any less either.  
  
Just then, Sakuragi for some reason or other yelled at Kyota his tone of voice amused as hell. "OI, NOZARU! (wild monkey!)", yelled Sakuragi at Kyota who was not far away from his side.  
  
Startled, Kyota almost turned around to face the red head monkey but when he did almost let his mark loose. Instead, without looking at Sakuragi and glaring at the player in front of him as if to stare him down so that he'd stay put replied back at him, his annoyance 100% full forced into his tone of voice despite the growing weariness that slightly mingled in it.  
  
"Nanda yo, Akage Saru?", said Kyota.  
  
Sakuragi snickered then, bringing out a vein out of Kyota's temple.  
  
"Why don't you just call out to that fan loving coach of yours, eh? You look just about as dead as Maki-jisan and Jin-kun..", taunted Sakuragi, his annoying tensai grin on his face.  
  
PISSED, Kyota swung around to face him, didn't give a shit about the player in front of him, and yelled. "NANDATO, AKAGE SARU! TAKE THAT BACK!".  
  
Sendoh went wide eyed at the scene before him and even wider still when an annoyed referee was coming up to them, his whistle about to slip in between his lips.  
  
"Ah, shit. If this continues on, they'll be disqualified", thought Sendoh, quickly trying to think up of something to avert the referee's attention.  
  
"HEAD'S UP, KYOTA!" yelled Sendoh, throwing the ball at the still very pissed wild monkey.  
  
Surprised and startled at the mention of his name, Kyota turned around and just in time caught the ball from smashing his face in.  
  
"WHAT THE HELL..", yelled Kyota a bit off balance at the sudden throw.  
  
"Kyota! The ball. The BALL!", said Sendoh, running towards him.  
  
As if realizing for the first time that the ball was actually in his hands, Kyota looked down at them, saw the ball and was off!  
  
Sendoh didn't know what the hell happened to him (Kyota) but it looked like someone had just stepped on his tail and he was seriously pissed off by it.  
  
Kyota zoomed in and out of the other player's way, followed in hot pursuit by Minoru and Sawakita right behind him.  
  
Seeing an opening, Kyota abruptly made a jump without pausing and held the ball in the air and was about to execute a shot under the basket when two pairs of arms and hands appeared blocking him like a wall. It was Sawakita's and Kuwata's block combination!  
  
There was no way he could make that shot.  
  
But there was no way it was going to just end there either.  
  
Suddenly, Kyota slammed the ball he had downwards away from the ring.  
  
Straight towards the awaiting gorilla centre player, Akagi!  
  
"YOSH!" Akagi said the minute the ball was in his possession.  
  
He immediately made a jump for the ring while Kawata and Sawakita was still in the air and in the mid process of falling back to the ground.  
  
With a resounding smash, he slammed the ball through the ring.  
  
"Alright! 2 points in GORI!" yelled Sakuragi as the scoreboard showed 87 (Kanagawa) to 109 (Akita).  
  
Akagi who had slapped high fives with a huffing and puffing Kyota slammed a pounding gori style hand behind Sakuragi's back making Sakuragi yell, "ITAI!".  
  
"SOKO, MINNA!" yelled Akagi as each of them raced down the other half side of the court.  
  
"So, how was my pass? Incredible, wasn't it?" said a smug looking Kyota, who ran beside Sakuragi.  
  
Sakuragi pulled the skin of the lower part of his eye, stuck out a tongue at him and said, "Which part of it was incredible, No Saru? You couldn't even get in a basket".  
  
"NANDATO?!", yelled Kyota outraged. "I'll shove those words right down your throat when I get those points for our team, AKAGE SARU!"  
  
"NO CHANCE IN HELL, AM I GOING TO LET YOU DO THAT!" yelled Sakuragi, with a snort.  
  
"OH YEAH?!"  
  
"HA!"  
  
"Temme matte royo (You just wait and see)", muttered the both of them as they glared each other before they separated off to take their respective positions.  
  
Sendoh and Akagi who had witnessed the scene just shook their heads in exasperation.  
  
It was bad enough that they fight and bring their nonsense bickering in the practicing games they had back during team practices but did they have to bring their nonsense now, in a real game? Hell, both of them were going to get hell from them and the rest of the Kanagawa team members for that.  
  
'At least that meant Kyota's back to his old self', thought Sendoh with an amused smile remembering one of the practice games they had together as a team that had a scene that looked very similar to this one. 'Kyota plays better if he's not under too much pressure caused by his opponent', observed Sendoh, thinking that he himself was TOO much pressurized by HIS own opponent.  
  
Then a thought occurred to him making him pause then grin in amusement.  
  
'Did Sakuragi do that in the first place just to fire the other monkey up I wonder?' he thought with a definite, amused grin.  
  
+++  
  
Rukawa who had also witnessed the bickering nonsense between the two earlier puffed out a small sigh of exasperation, his expression clearly telling anyone within sight that they were 100% complete idiots.  
  
Sawakita who was as usual facing him as his guard smiled then, making Rukawa's sense of alert heightened.  
  
Normally, Rukawa would have just ignored that smile of his which the current #1 player seemed to be doing a lot but this time he didn't.  
  
Because it was the same smile he had last seen the last time they had a match together at IH (inter-high).  
  
The smile that meant he was about to do some damage to the Kanagawa team's current situation.  
  
Before Rukawa even finished his thoughts, Sawakita, in the blink of an eye, slipped through Rukawa's tough defense and zoomed towards the goal area.  
  
"Ah, SHIT", cursed Rukawa under his breathe, as he ran top speed after Sawakita who was whistling for Fukatsu to pass the ball at him.  
  
Fukatsu immediately broke Sendoh's defensive barrier and ran pass him. Sendoh, who had no intention of letting Fukatsu pass the ball at anyone let alone at Sawakita, reconstructed his defensive wall, this time as tight as he could possibly make.  
  
Fukatsu, who was now trapped in Sendoh's wall, once again gritted his teeth cursing inwardly to himself that he couldn't pass the ball directly at Sawakita.  
  
But wait, an opening to his right..  
  
'Yes, there it is!', thought Fukatsu as he pulled his hand and launched the ball straight towards..  
  
"MIKIO!" yelled Sawakita the minute, Mikio had the ball in his grasp.  
  
Sakuragi who guarding Mikio was jumping up to steal the ball away from the tall opponent but Mikio was already throwing it back at Sawakita!  
  
"Dammit!" muttered Rukawa under his breathe as Sawakita made a beeline for the outside lane of the goal area.  
  
Sakuragi, who was as pissed as hell because he had just let a ball get the better of him, ran towards Sawakita, apparently wanted to get something back from him.  
  
Rukawa's eyes widened a bit when Sawakita was a step away from the 3 pointer line.  
  
Sakuragi so this too and his eyes widened even further than Rukawa's.  
  
'He's going to do the 3 pointer shot!', thought both of them at the same time, as Sawakita turned around now behind the 3 pointer line, glancing at the incoming players that had every intention of stopping him.  
  
Sawakita flashed them as half grin then, all the challenge written on his damn face as he jumped and readied to take his shot.  
  
As if in answer to the open challenge that was on Sawakita's face, both Rukawa and Sakuragi either growled or snarled back at him before they jumped up after him, their arms and hands outstretched far beyond their limits blocking Sawakita's view as much as possible.  
  
Their jump was so high and so powerful that they were going over the barrier of high school basketball standard jumps, making everyone looked on at them in fascination and disbelief.  
  
But it was also Sakuragi's and Rukawa's aggressive power and the force of the jump that made them slam against Sawakita's frame making him falling backwards to the ground...  
  
But not before Sawakita smirked at the two faces in front of him and executed a high arc, powerful 3 pointer shot.  
  
"Ah SHIT", muttered Rukawa under his breathe realizing their mistake and Sawakita's aim right then.  
  
Sakuragi, on the other hand, yelled his outrage when Sawakita's shot went right threw the net.  
  
"NANI!", he yelled, grinding his teeth in frustration, as the scoreboard showed 87(Kanagawa) to 112 (Akita)  
  
As if to make matters worse, the whistle blew and the referee shouted, "OFFENSE CHARGE. JUUBAN (ten) and JUUICHIBAN (11)! TWO FREE THROWS FOR THE AKITA SHOTEN TEAM!"  
  
The crowd roared their cheer for the Akita at this announcement.  
  
"NANI?!", shouted Sakuragi at the referee, his outrage fuelled even more but even before the referee felt offended, 3 sets of fists found themselves connected on Sakuragi's head, with Akagi delivering his infamous gorilla punch on top of his head, Rukawa giving him a severe blow at one side of his head and another blow at the other side by Kyota.  
  
All the three of them had at least one vein popping out of his temple, clearly restraining themselves from doing more than punch the daylights out of him.  
  
Sendoh who flinched at the pain that Sakuragi must be feeling right now, jogged up towards the referee who had called out the charge and apologized on behalf of Sakuragi saying that the red head was only joking.  
  
Appeased somewhat by Sendoh's reassurance, the referee continued the game so that Sawakita had his chance at has two free shots.  
  
"Sakuragi", said Akagi standing beside Sakuragi who was standing next to Rukawa, Kyota and Sendoh. "Cool that hot head of yours and stop yelling at everyone especially the referees or else you'll be disqualified".  
  
Sakuragi who didn't need anyone telling him that, wanted to shout just that at him but managed to restrain himself instead though it was a great feat to do so.  
  
"Yeah, Sakuragi-kun. We need all the help we can get to get back at the other team", said Sendoh, who was wiping sweat off his forehead "and that", he continued looking at the red head with a half grin, " also means we cannot afford to lose anyone including you, Sakuragi-kun".  
  
Sakuragi, who had been in a fuming bad mood, was now slowly cooling down at Sendoh's words.  
  
"Ceh", said Kyota with a snort at Sendoh's words but didn't agree or disagree with him.  
  
Akagi just nodded his agreement. What Sendoh had said was true. They couldn't afford to lose anyone on the team, including the red headed idiot no matter how much of a trouble he could bring to them.  
  
Rukawa, on the other hand, just puffed out a sigh and gave an indifferent shrug. "The world is about to end if we need this do'aho's help.."  
  
Snapping up like an over wounded spring, he lunged at Rukawa but was pretty banged up by Akagi.  
  
Just then, Sawakita had finished his two free shots and needlessly to say the other team gained another two points.  
  
All the other three players namely Akagi, Sendoh and Kyota were about to head off to when they stopped at a conversation that caught their interest behind them.  
  
"Yoh", said Sawakita pulling the attention of both Shohoku players, in front of him, namely the red head and the raven head.  
  
Sawakita then jerked a thumb towards the scoreboard.  
  
The score that showed 87(Kanagawa) to 114(Akita).  
  
A total of exactly 27 points behind.  
  
Yet again.  
  
"I heard the conversation between the two of you not a while ago", said Sawakita, a grin and a half smirk beginning to form on his face.  
  
Both Sakuragi's and Rukawa's eyes narrowed at him.  
  
"27 points behind and like what under 3 minutes?".  
  
The eyes were dangerously getting narrower by the minute.  
  
"Stop dreaming and start admitting defeat, kiddos", said Sawakita turning his back at them as Fukatsu called out for him. "There's no way you guys can beat us much less take over my current #1 position".  
  
Five pairs of dangerously, blazing eyes bore at his back but Sawakita did not show any signs that he was aware of it.  
  
"..also there's another thing that you don't know...", Sawakita continued without pausing in his tracks and slightly turned his back to glance at the Kanagawa team behind him.  
  
"...all of you just don't know who the heck you're dealing with. We're the Akita team. There is absolutely NOBODY who can defeat the team that holds the champions of the champions".  
  
+++  
  
Out on the stands of the audience, Sakuragi's gundam noticed the blazing aura of fire that was getting larger and larger by the minute. The murderous aura that swirled around all the five Kanagawa players on court.  
  
"Uh, oh", said Takamiya, going over against the railing as if to get a better view of the scene developing before him. "The guy's are BURNING over there", he stated the obvious.  
  
Noma and Ookusu nodded their agreement saying their chorus of, "Hn, Hn".  
  
Youhei, who had an eyebrow raised questioningly at the five players, turned to look at what may possibly have caused the dangerous auras emitting from them. He spotted a white jersey player in front of them, nearly bald and had his back facing the other five players.  
  
'That guy', thought Youhei watching the particular player with his eyebrows furrowed together into a thoughtful frown. 'What's his name again? Sawakita?'. He spotted the name etched behind the guy's back which confirmed his thoughts and wondered, 'What's he saying to them?'.  
  
It was then that both Sakuragi and surprisingly Rukawa called out to the white jersey guy in front of them. Their auras of fire, a mixture of red and blue, being the largest amongst the five Kanagawa players.  
  
+++  
  
"Sawakita!", said both Sakuragi and Rukawa simultaneously, with Sakuragi in a loud barely restrained angry voice and Rukawa in a growl loud enough for Sawakita to hear.  
  
The mention of his name made Sawakita halt and made him slowly turn around.  
  
Black eyes met 2 pairs of blazing fire liquid lava eyes and freezing cool sapphire eyes.  
  
The fire that was surrounding both players was now dangerously getting stronger and hotter and the air around them fairly sizzled with the tension of it.  
  
Slowly, as if in unison, both Sakuragi and Rukawa held up their fists with their thumbs sticking out horizontally on the other side.  
  
Then pointing their fist thumbs downwards at him and at the team behind him, they said.. "YOU ARE GOING DOWN!"  
  
+++  
  
TBC...  
  
Hn. As usual if you have something to say about this chapter or anything about this fic, click the 'review' button just down below!  
  
THANKS for taking the time to read this fic.  
  
Oh yeah, btw... can't guarantee for 'sooner' updates.. sorry.  
  
However, if I have not been updating for ... at least a week or so after my last update then please scream for me at yuki_ne@hotmail.com or just write to me through your review and remind me to update. Sometimes I just forget to do so.. *sigh* like this chap for instance. Actually, I've done this chap for a while now... and I thought I've already posted it here on FF.net but when I checked for the chap just now.. uh... I was like 'Huh? Where the heck did chap 9 go? Haven't I already posted it?' (-_-;). Hn. Anyway, just remind me ok? Doumo..  
  
Right...  
  
C u in later days! ^^ 


	10. chapter10, Boys with the attitue, COMBI!

A/N: ARRGH!!! I hate it when I almost get to the end of a fic because this is when and where my writer's block starts to settle itself in... #$%#! AHEM. Excuse me about that. But ah.. never mind about that ;  
  
Btw, I'm very sorry for the very very very late update.  
  
Anways..  
  
As I was about to say...  
  
To reviewers:  
  
Infinity Serenity - thanks for having the time reading this fic and giving me the encouragement. I seriously need some (I think) ; And of yeah.. that thumb down part... love that one though I dun know where that came from (--;).  
  
Roselle - Hn... doumo for having to read the fic for this long . And yeah, I hope the story goes as great as it currently is ... (). This writer block thingy is bugging the heck out of me --; Anyways, thanks for your encouragement too!   
  
Mitsune - Now you are one enthusiastic Shohoku fan ; Thanks for taking the time to read the fic and for sending in your review!  
  
Lizack - Wah! Love your nickname, 'Lizack', though I dun fancy lizards v. much LOL (--;). Ahem, excuse me about that, . Anyways, thanks for the comment and also for sending in your review! (Actually, I also can't wait to see Sakuragi and Rukawa beat the heck out of Sawakita even though I'm suppose to know how they'd do just that --;)  
  
Anonymous - Hn.. you're one mysterious person what with your nickname 'anonymous' ; But never mind. Update soon? Hn. Hn. Hn. I'd update sooner if I had a chapter finished sigh Anyways, sori to make you (and the other reviews and readers) wait. But thanks for sending in your review (or should I say reminder? ;).   
  
animeluverjc- Thanks for the words of encourgement. Keeps me going!  
  
Yun Fei - Yoh. Sori I updated so late. You've sent me two reminers already but nvm. Thanks for taking the time to read me fic!  
  
The Wobbly Guy - Hn. Thanks for the tip. It's really interesting.  
  
Animeps- Ho... Hi! Thanks for liking my fic.... and reading it. ;  
  
To all reviewers: Thanks for the reviews! Always good to know that some people actually read this fic of mine ;   
  
Disclaimers: Slam Dunk belongs to Takehiko Inoue sensei. I, on the other hand, own nothing except for this fanfic and the star combi's my idea;  
  
A/N: This is NON-YAOI. Story takes place after Shohoku's match against Sannoh. Their match against Sannoh can be found in the last six volumes of SD.  
  
And btw, I have no idea how the yen thing goes so I just simply put in a number.   
  
Btw, warning: language (ok maybe not serious but yeah know, just in case)   
  
Some parts from the previous chapter i.e.   
  
09: The start of a comeback; YOU ARE GOING DOWN!  
  
"Yoh", said Sawakita pulling the attention of both Shohoku players, in front of him, namely the red head and the raven head.  
  
Sawakita then jerked a thumb towards the scoreboard.  
  
The score that showed 87(Kanagawa) to 114(Akita).  
  
A total of exactly 27 points behind.  
  
Yet again.  
  
"I heard the conversation between the two of you not a while ago", said Sawakita, a grin and a half smirk beginning to form on his face.  
  
Both Sakuragi's and Rukawa's eyes narrowed at him.  
  
"27 points behind and like what under 3 minutes?".  
  
The eyes were dangerously getting narrower by the minute.  
  
"Stop dreaming and start admitting defeat, kiddos", said Sawakita turning his back at them as Fukatsu called out for him. "There's no way you guys can beat us much less take over my current #1 position".  
  
Five pairs of dangerously, blazing eyes bore at his back but Sawakita did not show any signs that he was aware of it.  
  
"..also there's another thing that you don't know...", Sawakita continued without pausing in his tracks and slightly turned his back to glance at the Kanagawa team behind him.  
  
"...all of you just don't know who the heck you're dealing with. We're the Akita team. There is absolutely NOBODY who can defeat the team that holds the champions of the champions".  
  
It was then that both Sakuragi and surprisingly Rukawa called out to the white jersey guy in front of them. Their auras of fire, a mixture of red and blue, being the largest amongst the five Kanagawa players.  
  
"Sawakita!", said both Sakuragi and Rukawa simultaneously, with Sakuragi in a loud barely restrained angry voice and Rukawa in a growl loud enough for Sawakita to hear.  
  
The mention of his name made Sawakita halt and made him slowly turn around.  
  
Black eyes met 2 pairs of blazing fire liquid lava eyes and freezing cool sapphire eyes.  
  
The fire that was surrounding both players was now dangerously getting stronger and hotter and the air around them fairly sizzled with the tension of it.  
  
Slowly, as if in unison, both Sakuragi and Rukawa held up their fists with their thumbs sticking out horizontally on the other side.  
  
Then pointing their fist thumbs downwards at him and at the team behind him, they said..   
  
"YOU ARE GOING DOWN!"  
  
10: The boys with the attitude; Sakuragi and Rukawa COMBI!   
  
A raven haired young woman, who was wearing a red cap, bit the side of her lip in anxiety and brimming excitement as she shifted restlessly in her seat at the back of the taxi car that she was in.   
  
The taxi driver sensing his customer's restlessness and excitement looked at her by the review mirror with a grin as yet again she shifted herself into another position as if uncomforatable in her seat.   
  
"Should be about finished by now, shouldn't it?", said the driver, refering to the place of destination they were heading and the event he knew that was being held there.  
  
The young woman turned sharply to look at the driver in the reviewer mirror, startled from the worry that she was currently in.   
  
She blinked once then twice at the kind faced man who was still grinning at her at the reviewer mirror. "Finished?", she asked as if she didn't know what he was refering to.   
  
The taxi driver slightly raised an eyebrow at her. Seeing the blank look on her face and the apparent worry in it said gently, "The IP tournament that's being held there. If I'm not mistaken from what I know from last night's news, there's a match being held there between the Kanagawa team and the Akita team".  
  
She blinked but only once. Then, realizing her current state, she closed her eyes and shook her head as if to shake off her blank and numbed state before she opened her eyes again and look at the driver through the reviewer mirror.  
  
She smiled sheepishly. "Ano..., summimasen (excuse me/sorry), Ji-san (sir). I didn't mean to go off blankly like that".  
  
The taxi driver just smiled and waved one hand off the steering wheel a sign that clearly showed he did not mind at all. "Mah, mah. That's alright, young lady. I can see that you're anxious about something. If you don't mind my asking, Miss, does it have anything to do with the match at the indoor court stadium where we're headed?".  
  
A slight frown creased the side of her lips at that as some of her worry was seeping back into her expression at the mention of the game. "Hai".  
  
When she wasn't quick enough to elaborate and explain, the taxi driver continued to ask, "So which team do you support? Are you an Akita fan? I'm not much of a basketball fan myself so I don't know a lot about it especially high school basketball. But I've got a son and a couple of nephews who says that Akita team has got to be one of the best teams that the nation has ever had. Of course, I think that they've said that because the Sannoh team which happens to be the champion for 22 years in a row in high school basketball's in it".  
  
The taxi driver droned on and on not realizing that customer at the back was silent and in deep thought.   
  
It was only when the driver realized that they were going to arrive soon at their destination that he remembered the question he had put to his customer earlier and he still hadn't got an answer.  
  
"Well? Which team do you support? My son and nephews put about a thousand yen bet each to their friends that the Akita team would win an easy match with the opposing team".  
  
The driver didn't realize it but his question and the comment about the bet put an invisble but intense pressure on her. She almost sighed her relief when the taxi stopped at the foyer of the indoor stadium, clearly arrived at her requested destination.   
  
She quickly paid the driver and stepped out of the taxi but didn't forget his earlier question.   
  
The taxi driver was about to call her but she cut him off with a smile as she popped her head back in for a minute, letting the door to the passenger seat still open.  
  
"I'd bet thrice the amount of the bet that your son and nephews put in", she suddenly said with a half smile, a gleam of something the driver wasn't sure that he saw went past her brown eyes in a second.   
  
A bit surprised by her unexpected answer, he smiled then. "For the Akita team?".  
  
The young woman gave a wide smile then one he knew that his mentioned son and nephews would find hard to resist.   
  
"Iie", said the raven haired young woman, winking and smiling at him as she gave him the peace sign with her fingers. "I have no doubt that MY team will win".  
  
With that she gently closed the passenger seat, adjusted her red cap, red jacket and backpack in place and rushed toward the entrance.   
  
But before that she gave him a wave of good bye and thanks as well as a thumbs up. A grin etched on her face.  
  
It was also not the only thing that he noticed.  
  
He also wondered right then how he didn't notice it earlier on. Because..  
  
Right on her front cap, a few prominent characters were etched on it in black.  
  
The proud characters that shouted:  
  
"KANAGAWA!".  
  
A bespectacled dark brown haired young man glanced back at his wrist watch for the fourth time in the last ten minutes, clearly worried about something or at least must late for something if his gestures meant anything.   
  
'Less than ten minutes until the game ends', thought the man, tapping the end of his foot lightly in his worry and increasing excitement. 'They should be about at the last part of the game when I arrive there'.  
  
He looked up at the station map above his head. He counted the number of stations that he had to stop by to get to his destination and the time for him to get there. 'About 4 more stations. Hope I get there just in time'.  
  
Just then the subway train stopped at a station, doors sliding open to let other passengers off it and admit new passengers into it.   
  
He squeezed aside a bit to let the people pass him either in or out of the train. The train rang out a warning then telling any last minute passengers that their doors were about to close when a familiar voice rang out an alarmed, "Matte! (Wait!)".  
  
The bespectacled man who was among the passengers who stood by near the door was startled by the shout and turned to see a small built high school boy running on top speed towards the closing door.  
  
"What the...", said a couple of startled men, among them the said besepctacled man as they gave way to the boy who lunged into the small space though the door and made it in time to get tinto the train.  
  
"Oi, oi. Becareful, boy. You'll hurt yourself if you make a habit of doing that", said an older looking man looking disapprovingly at the boy.   
  
The boy who was trying to catch is breathe huffed and puffed from his rush but he managed to put a hand behind his head and said sheepishly, "Summiasen (sorry)".  
  
The older man just shook his head and let his attention elsewhere.  
  
It was then that the young boy's gaze met the gaze of the spectacled man in font of him.  
  
An immediate recognition flashed by their expressions before surprise mirrored the other's.  
  
"Kogure-san!", said the boy, with his eyes wide with surprise.  
  
The brown eyes behind the bespectacled man widened a bit then at the mention of his name. "Hikoichi-kun?".  
  
Hikoichi immediately nodded apparently excited that Kogure, former vice-captain of Shohoku which was one of his team's, Ryonan, strongest rivals, remembered him. "What are you doing here, Kogure-san? I'd thought you'd already be there for the Kanagwa Vs Akita team in Tokyo".  
  
As usual he went straight to the point thought Kogure who remembered Hikoichi as the unofficial reporter or information gatherer for the Ryonan team.   
  
Kogure just smiled and said, "Yes, I know. But unfortunately, I've had some unfinshed uni stuff to do so I couldn't get to go and see the game earlier myself. How about you, Hikoichi-kun? Aren't you one of the Kanagawa team's managers?".  
  
Hikoichi sighed then, "Yeah, I am. But I had to do make a report on this other game the Nagasaki team Vs the Osaka team. My sister (the main reporter for a daily sports magazine) couldn't do it since she had to make a report on another match elsewhere which also happens to be at the same time as this other match. In other words, she dragged me into it and threatened me that if I refused to do it for her she's going to make my life miserable".  
  
A sweatdrop ran down the side of Kogure's head at this. "Ah, soka ...", he said,not knowing what else to say.  
  
"Anyway", said Hikoichi, brightening up. "The match was truly incredible the one between Nagasaki and Osaka. Eventhough they were evenly matched, Osaka won by two points. The excitement of the game still lingers with me. It's also what's making me exicted at the game bewteen our hometown and the Akita team".  
  
Kogure just nodded.  
  
"I hope the Kanagawa players are doing fine", said Hikoichi almost to himself as a flash of his team's chosen members flashed passed his mind as well as a certain red head and a certain raven head.  
  
Kogure nodded and agreed grimly remembering that Sannoh, one of the Akita's joint teams, was not one team to be taken lightly despite the fact that the Shohoku team did win over them by a hair in the last IH games.  
  
"From my research of the Akita team and from what I've personally observed from the recorded videos from the last match that you guys, the Shohoku, had with the Sannoh team, ..... even I'm worried about what the outcome will be in this match", said Hikoichi worried and anxious.  
  
Kogure who was as worried and anxious as Hikoichi said calmly as if to reassure him as well as himself, " Daijoubu, Hikoichi-kun. The Kanagawa team will not be beaten easily by any team and that includes Akita no matter how strong anyone says there are".  
  
The train slowed down then with an automated voice annoucing their next stop.   
  
As they stepped off the train and exitted the subway station together, each of their minds thought of the same thing.  
  
' Ganbareyou, Minna-san'.  
  
Three fast moving figures zoomed towards the main door that lead into the indoor court. The lone figure apparently not noticing the other two zooming figures that was fast heading towards the same direction. Apprently, the other two figures did notice the other figure as well as they smashed into each other at the door with a loud BANG.  
  
The impact made all three fall back onto their backs and each letting out a shriek, a gasp and a yelp.   
  
"Why, you....", said a bubbling enraged red cap female.  
  
"Ano, summimasen...", said a darkly brown haired man, adjusting his glasses while he started to get up.  
  
"I..Itai yo..", said a boy, cringing from the sting of his no doubt slightly bruised butt.  
  
It was then all three looked at the other at the same time.  
  
"AYAKO-SAN!", said both Kogure and Hikoichi simultaneously, their surprise evident on their faces.  
  
"KOGURE-SEMPAI! HIKOICHI-KUN!", said a surprised but delighted Ayako as she was helped to stand up from both of them.   
  
"O genki desu ka, Kogure-sempai? Are you done already with your uni work?", asked Ayako, grinning from side to side, glad to see her senior since it had been a long time that she, and the rest of the team, haven't seen him for a while.  
  
"Sa... ma ne...", said Kogure, a hand behind his head with a slight smile.  
  
"How about you, Hikoichi-kun?", said Ayako, turning to face Hikoichi who turned red faced under his senior's stern scrutinity. "How was the report?".  
  
"Just fine, Ayako-sempai... Ha ha", said Hikoichi a bit nervously at Ayako's famous stern face and sharp look. Like Kogure he also had a hand behind his head. Somehow, Ayako reminded him a bit of his elder sister.  
  
"Ano.. Ayako-san. What's the score of the match right now?", said Kogure trying not to show his anxiety though the excitement was still there in his voice and ecpression.  
  
Ayako's eyebrows rasied at that and shrugged as answer. "Sa. I've no idea. Like you two I've just came here so I've missed most of the game".  
  
Seeing the surprised look on Kogure's face, she explained as the three proceeded to enter the indoor court through the door. "Family crisis back at home. So can't go with the guys here in Tokyo. In fact, it's a lucky break that I'm even here. Looks like my lucks looking up".  
  
Kogure just nodded at her as the stadium erupted in a series deafening cheer as well as some jeer.  
  
Ayako slapped one hand against one ear closed as another loud cheer burst on one side of the stadium, chanting, "AKITA! AKITA! AKITA!".  
  
Hikoichi, on the other hand, had his notebook pulled out and was scribbling something furoiusly into it.  
  
They walked far enough towards the court and almost arrived at the Kanagwa team bench area when they saw the score.  
  
84 (Kanagawa) to 114 (Akita)  
  
27 points difference.  
  
With time less than 3 minutes.  
  
However, that was not the only thing that had captured their attentions.  
  
Hikoichi was the first to voice it out.   
  
"W...What happened?".  
  
Silence reigned the minds of the all the Kanagawa members especially the ones on court. The defeaning noise that filled the stadium was drowned by the expanse silence of it, only broken by Sawakita's echoing words.  
  
Words that meant war.  
  
From the bench...  
  
Miyagi, who was among the people who heard Sawakita's insulting words, cracked his knuckles unconsiously, the sound dangeously threatening for all who heard it. "Yarou", growled Miyagi at the ace Akita player.  
  
Mitsui, on the other hand, clenched his teeth so hard he didn't care that he was crushing all his teeth and in danger of losing them in the process. "That bastard kid is asking for trouble", he said through his clenched teeth.  
  
Maki and Fujima who was burning up with rage like the rest of the team members, just clenched their fists and gave a sharp look towards opposing team specifically at Sawakita. 'Gaki...', the word in both their thoughts.   
  
All the centres especially Uozumi had to be restrained by the less passionately enraged players from doing chaos on court.  
  
The coaches were also not to be left out from their own enraged states...  
  
Taoka sensei, like Uozumi had to be physically restrained by some of the team members. Takato sensei, on the other hand, was more restrained in his rage by only splitting his favourite fan in half.   
  
While Anzai sensei, on the other hand, didn't show any signs of outrage. In fact, he just gave off his infamous chuckle inwardly (knowing that he'll get the other sense's overboard with their own raged states if he did chuckle outwardly).  
  
Calmly and quietly, the white haired old man then said,  
  
"Sa.. Let the game.. begin".  
  
On court...  
  
"Do'aho", said Rukawa, approaching his red headed teammate from the back.  
  
Sakuragi who was literally burning in his own spiral of red aura around him heard his kitsune of a teammate call him and said without facing him. "Ah, wakataroyou".  
  
Meanwhile...  
  
Akagi had just in time caught the back of Kyota's red jersey uniform, though just barely, from letting the wild monkey run lose and beat the daylights out of the arrogant ace player.  
  
"DAMMIT! Let me beat the crap out of that piece of shit!", said Kyota furiously, lunging forward but Akagi's gorilla grip was too strong.   
  
Akagi who could barely keep his temper in check at Sawakita's remark, said calmly his words flowing out slowly and carefully as if afraid that he'd lose his hold on his temper and said to Kyota, "Beating the hell out of him's very tempting, I know. Because you're not the only one who'd like to send in a punch or two at the bastard. However, we have a game to win. And I as hell don't one anyone to get disqualified from this team that includes you, do you hear me, Kyota? Now calm down and set your mind onto the game".  
  
Kyota grinded his jaws down so hard he almost lost his tongue in the process of his effort to calm himself down.  
  
When Akagi was sure that Kyota was cool enough, he set the wild monkey free from his gorilla grip.   
  
Messing up his hair like Maki would to him, Akagi said to Kyota. "Sa, let's surprise the shit out of them and show them what we, the Kanagawas, have got that they haven't seen yet".  
  
Surprised at the encouraging words of the infamous gorilla like former Shohoku captain, Kyota unknowingly cooled down at his words. Replacing his rage was the burning will and determination which was equal in intensity.  
  
"Ah", managed a determined and fired up Kyota, saying his agreement.  
  
Kyota knew that he was not the only one who had the same feeling of an iron will of thrist to win as the gorilla captain raised one eyebrow slightly and said, "Then, let's go".  
  
"Nani yo...", muttered Sendoh, a dangerous gleam flashed through his eyes as his lips began to widen to a definite Sendoh style grin. Adrenaline was slowly pumping through his veins, his mind and body beginning to react to Sawakita's insulting words.   
  
Sendoh was seriously beginnning to get serious.   
  
"Yoh, Fukatsu", said Sendoh to the point guard player who had the ball in front of him which made the other player startled but instantly causing him to be cautiously alert.   
  
"Nanda?", said Fukatsu, looking at Sendoh suspisiously as if trying to see whether Sendoh trying to distract him or not by his sudden mood to talk.  
  
Sendoh just gave off that grin of his and said, "The fun starts here!".  
  
With lightning quick reflexes, Sendoh smoothly stole the ball away from Fukatsu and already yelling for fast break to his other teammates.  
  
Unperturbed by the steal, Fukatsu yelled "Defense!" to his teammates and zoomed after Sendoh who was not far ahead of him.   
  
The minute Sendoh stole the ball out from Fukatsu's hands Kyota zoomed down the other half side of the court leaving a startled and a taken aback Minoru from the Akita team behind.  
  
Akagi, however, was not to be left behind as he too along with the King Kong centre of Akita ran towards the goal under the post either to defend or guard it.   
  
Whiile a certain red head and raven head was not to be seen anywhere on the other half side of the court.  
  
Sendoh, who didn't pause for a minute in his run even though Fukatsu had managed to run pass him and now trying to block his way, glanced around at his surroundings, saw his chance with Kyota and without a moment's hesitation passed the ball to an awaiting Kyota.  
  
Kyota made a mad dash for the board, sleekly running past the defensive walls of Minoru and Mikio.  
  
Knowing that he had no chance to get a goal anywhere near the basket, with Kawata guarding there, Kyota took his chance and made a mid range jump shot in within the free throw area.  
  
Kyota's shot almost made it when a long arm appeared literally out of nowhere in front of the ball and the hand attached to it slammed the orange ball away from the net. The impact of the hit was so hard, only an orange blur could be seen flying through the air and about to crash on earth.  
  
Then a saving hand caught the ball...  
  
It was Rukawa's!  
  
But Sawakita saw this move earlier on and lunged for the ball, slapping it away from Rukawa's grip incredibly without the whistle being blown.  
  
Fukatsu, who saw Sawakita's intended move, caught the lose ball and made a mad dash for the other half side of the court but he was not going to get anywhere near there if Sendoh had something to say or rather do about it.   
  
Sendoh, who by now knew Fukatsu's every moves and reading them as easily as an open book, once agin stole the ball right out of Fukatsu's hold. This time however instead of making a pass to one of his teammates, he decided to zoom in and and took his chance at a shot.  
  
Seeing through his reckless plan, Sawakita, Fukatsu and Minoru made a dash for Sendoh. But Sendoh effortlessly danced pass Minoru and Fukatsu. However, Sawakita was a different story altogether.  
  
Sawakita had made an immediate tight wall of defense the minute Sendoh faced him with the ball still in Sendoh's possession.   
  
Seeing that he had no chance of letting in a shot after all, Sendoh looked out for an opening to pass the ball all the while pretending that he still intened to make his shot.   
  
"There's no way am I going to let you shoot", said a determined faced Sawakita, daring him to make the shot with a straight look in his eyes.  
  
Sendoh spotted it then.  
  
"Works fine with me", said a grinnning Sendoh. Feigning a pass by his left hand to pass to his left side, Sawakita moved slightly to the left knowing that it was a feint and made his right side tighther than it already was when suddenly the ball was rolled through Sendoh's stood apart legs and then through Sawakita's widely stood apart legs, letting the ball pass through him towards an awaiting Kanagawa member at the back!  
  
"What the hell...", said a taken aback Sawakita apparently didn't anticipate a 'bowling ball roll' Sakuragi style technique get the better of him (of course if there was such a technique used by the red head).  
  
"Nice pass!", said Kyota who made an immediate scoop of the ball and pass it to an awaiting Akagi who was right under the basket.  
  
"SHOOT IT, AKAGI!", shouted Mitsui from the bench who had sprang up from his seat the minute Akagi had the ball in his hands. Shaking his fist at the primate, he shoouted again after giving a brief glance at the scoreboard and at the time. "The 30 seconds violation is almost up! You guys have about 10 seconds left! JUST SHOOT!".  
  
"DO IT, AKAGI!", roared the boss saru from the bench, making some of the people who still had him held restrained on the bench fly on one side. "KILL THAT BASTARD!".  
  
"OFFENSE! OFFENSE! OFFENSE!", shouted the rest of the Kanagawa members some either jumping up and down and some just waved their fists in support.  
  
"HO!", roared Akagi as he jumped for the ring.  
  
"HO!", roared Kawata, as loudly as his adversary as he too jumped to block Akagi's shot.  
  
"SHOOT IT!", screamed the Kanagawa supporters.  
  
And Akagi shot it.  
  
But his shot was futile as Kawata intercepted the shot easily with his infamous 'Steamboat' block and whammed it to Sawakita's direction.  
  
But even before the ball could get anywhere near Sawakita something flashed in between the distance where Sawakita stood and where Kawata and Akagi were who were still in the process of falling towards the ground.   
  
The crowd began to chant the count down to the 30 seconds violation..  
  
"5!"  
  
The blurry figure that flashed itself in between them, stole the ball away and...  
  
"4!"  
  
"'AHO!", said Rukawa loud enough by Rukawa's standards as he pulled his hand back to pass the ball to...  
  
But Fukatsu and Minoru was already in fornt of him, their faces telling him clearly that they wouldn't let him pass the ball over them that easily....  
  
"3!"  
  
"KITSUNE! KOI!", shouted Sakuragi, who was blocked from the raven head's view by the bodies of the two guards that were blocking him.  
  
Unintimidated by the wall of bodies in front of him, Rukawa made a powerful pass to the awaiting red head right over his guards.  
  
"YOSH!", said Sakuragi the second the ball was in his possession.  
  
"'AHO!", warned Rukawa urgently, as he raced towards him the second he noticed Sawakita advancing on the red head at an incredible speed.  
  
"2!"  
  
All the Kanagawa members gasped and almost all of them jumped to their feet as the red head jumped into the air, arms made in a high arch, ball in the air attempting to...  
  
"1!"  
  
"No, you don't!", yelled Sawakita as he leaped in front of Sakuragi his one arm blocking his shot...  
  
Sakuragi grinned then.  
  
It was then Sawakita realised his mistake.  
  
Sakuragi executed his shot but not before Sawakita 'accidentally' banged Sakuragi's arm with his own outstretched arm that was meant only to block his shot.  
  
"0!".  
  
"PHEWWWW!", whistled the refree immediately and at the same time the time went up and...  
  
The ball swished through the net.  
  
For a 3 pointer shot.  
  
Silence reigned the whole stadium as everyone awaited the referee's final judgement...  
  
The refree who was like everyone else what with sweat runnning all over his face, held up a hand and showed up three of his fingers.  
  
"3 points for the red team! And offense charge, hacking no#9, white team! ONE FREE THROW FOR THE RED TEAM!".   
  
Stunned silence followed suit then....  
  
A certain boy broke it.  
  
"NANI?!", yelled Hikoichi in stunned disbelief and awe. "Un... UNBELIEVABLE!".  
  
A second after that announcement, the whole stadium burst into a defeaning uproar of disbelief mingled with an increase of buzzing excitement.  
  
Everyone one of the members of the Kanagawa team as well as the loyal supporters of Kanagawa except for a certain raven head and snow haired man had their jaws loose on the ground beneath them.  
  
Sakuragi seemingly unaware of all this, just gave an exultant punch in the air in front of him yelling "YOSH!" and was grinning from side to side.  
  
When the red head looked up, he saw Rukawa giving him a look that had one eyebrow slightly arched up a bit. Whatever that look meant, it was not a look of surprise.  
  
Sakuragi grinned at the kitsune before noticing the referee who had the ball with him coming purposefully towards him.   
  
"I've lived up to my tensai name", said Sakuragi, refering to his shot and move just now, as he smiled smugly at the raven haired kitsune.  
  
The arched eyebrow raised a bit higher but Rukawa didn't say anything. Although, he did gave the slightest roll of his eyes and looked about to puff out an exasperated sigh but didn't.  
  
Rukawa wiped the sweat off his forehead before saying, "Miss this shot and I'll   
  
kill you on the spot, do'aho". He had said this in an underlying dangerous tone of voice.  
  
But Sakuragi didn't seem to have heard it or he simply was just not threatened by Rukawa's threat.   
  
The referee gave the ball to him then and he was given the chance for his one free throw shot.  
  
Sakuragi's focus of the intended shot for the basket was so deep that his effort was rewarded with a clean shot through the net.  
  
Needless to say, the shot had everyone (specifically the Kanagawa team and its supporters) reeling with another round wave of shock and total amazement.  
  
The score was now 88 (Kanagawa) to 114 (Akita)  
  
Sakarugi's maniacal laughter of exultance was almost drowned out by the thunderous appaluas and screaming cheers from both the stands and the court that he was receiving.  
  
"ALRIGHT, HANAMICHI!", yelled Miyagi from the sidelines, who was jumping up and down, forgetting at the moment that he was supposed to be exhausted and drained of energy.  
  
"YOSH! SAKURAGI!", yelled Mitsui who was standing beside Miyagi but unlike him he just gave the red head a thumbs up.  
  
Sakuragi just grinned at his two shohoku teammates and threw them both a double thumbs up.  
  
Before the red head knew what knocked the air out of him, he found himself being dragged to the other side of the court, his head in a head lock around a gorilla like arm.  
  
"Sakuragi! We're still in the game and time's not on our side right now so there's no time for us to celebrate this early! Mind on the game!", Akagi half roared into Sakuragi's ear.  
  
"ITAI!", yelled Sakuragi pushing his gorilla- like captain away from him and rubbing his ringing ears.  
  
Sakuragi glared at Akagi on full force and said, "Wakataroyou, Gori!".  
  
Sakuragi was about to jog off to his position when Akagi called out for him.   
  
"Sakuragi!".  
  
Sakuragi turned around and gave him an irritated look.   
  
Akagi made a solemn face and then held up a thumb up. "Nice play".  
  
With that Akagi left to his rightful place underneath the board.  
  
Sakuragi who would have normally zoned out and get overwhelmed by a mere compliment by anyone about his basketball abilities and get his head in the clouds with big neon words that declared that he was a 'TENSAI' just nodded solemnly and went back to concentrate on the game.  
  
Everyone who had witnessed this, scratched their heads to nothingness, wondering what the hell was wrong with the normally self-proclaimed tensai and his lack of his response to such a rare compliment.  
  
On the stands...  
  
"Ano... Do you think Sakuragi's suffereing a mental break down or something?", said Takamiya almost to himself then to his three other gundam friends.  
  
"Hai. Hai. So desu yo", said Noma and Ookuma simulataneously, bobbing their heads up and down in an undeniable agreement.  
  
"Mental break down?", asked Haruko not understanding. "Sakuragi-kun wa daijoubu desuka?".  
  
Yohei who was looking all amused and exasperated by what they're saying and what was happenning right in front of his eyes replied, "Daijoubu desu yo, Haruko-san. Don't listen to what the guys are saying. They're just kidding".  
  
Haruko just frowned a little not sure she was buying what Yohei was saying to her.  
  
Yohei saw this and gave her a reassuring smile. "Sakuragi's concentration is in full force right now, Haruko-san. That's all there is to it".  
  
Haruko didn't say anything at his reassurance but she did give a slow small smile and a nod saying that she understood.  
  
All of them went back to watch the game which was getting interesting by the minute.  
  
In Youhei's mind, he thought as he watched two certain figures on the court.  
  
'I wonder what those two troublemakers are up to?'.  
  
###  
  
"Holy shit", cursed a sweating black haired monkey, his hair sticking flat on his face and his purple head band determined to hold off the rest of his black mane away from his distorteredly upset face.  
  
'How in hell are we going to pull of a win out of this match?', said Kyota, his mind not thinking straight as the less than three minutes ticked by rather fast.  
  
Mentally he cursed the fast moving clock for going too fast and not giving them time to counter the damn Akitas.  
  
Kyota caught the knowing grin on his guard's face as if he knew what he was thinking about which only made Kyota madder than ever.  
  
Kyota almost gave him a what for verbally but then happened to catch sight of an unsual schene not far to his right.  
  
Rukawa was facing Sawakita and as usual Sawakita seemed to drop off a thing or two about something or other which could've inspired a saint to pull out the other person's hair but Rukawa was Rukawa, all made up of cool stuff and the works, revealing nothing in his slightly reddish and sweaty face a result from the exertion. No, this was not the schene that he found unusual. The thing that was, was what Rukawa was doing.  
  
Kyota could have missed it if he hadn't glanced his way.  
  
One of Rukawa's outstrecthed hands (in defense mode), was gesturing in a way that he was pointing to something on his other side with a thunmbs down. He making brief eye contact with someone.  
  
Frowning and curiousity piqued, Kyota wondered at who he was giving the signal to.  
  
Kyota looked at Sendoh, but Sendoh was too busy stirring up something with the Akita's main point guard, grining all the way. The point gurad, Fukatsu, however, didn't look amused. In fact, his expression told anyone who cared to see that he was anything but amused.   
  
Kyota glanced at the Gori, the former formidible captain of Shohoku looking as intimidating as ever under the basket. At least as intimidating as he can get what with the other primate looking as if Akagi was no match against the King Kong of Kongs of the Akita team. He also didn't seem to look like he noticed anything from any of the other players much less Rukawa's subtle signalling gesture.  
  
Finally, Kyota's eyes rested on the flaming red head's figure, who was standing tall and proud eventhough albeit overshadowed by at least a foot by the giant beast who he had the duty of covering. It also didn't seem like Sakuragi was the one that Rukawa had been given the signalling gesture ... although Kyota noticed a few seconds later that Sakuragi suddenly grinned from side to side and was slapping the back of his thigh with one of his tennis racket sized hands yelling 'YOSH!' and was looking at the big fat of modified blubber in front of him with a typical up to something Sakuragi grin.  
  
###  
  
On the bench...  
  
"Uh, oh. Hanamichi's up to something", said Miyagi who noticed the red head's reaction.  
  
"Eh? Nanda?", said Mitsui, frowning and looked at Sakuragi. "He looks as his maniacal usual self to me".  
  
"That and the fact that he's making that face", said Miyagi, a concerened frown creasing his forehead. "He only makes that face when he's going to do something stupid".  
  
"Oh, yeah?", said Mitsui not believing a word Miyagi said. To him, no matter what face Sakuragi made, he more often than not do stupid things.   
  
"I don't mean the usual Sakuragi stupidity", said Miyagi, seeing that Mitsui didn't follow what he was trying to say. "Rememeber the study camp we had last time when the boss's still in the third year?".  
  
Mitsui nodded. "What about it?".  
  
"You remembered how his face looked like right before we saw the captain's face?".  
  
"Akagi's face?", said Mitsui more to himself than to anyone as he scrunched up his face trying to remember that day. Then, Mitsui burst out laughing, startling and puzzling a few other players near them on the bench.  
  
"You mean, the scribbled face of Akagi's", said Mitsui with a grin.   
  
Under the goal post on their side of the court, Akagi suddenly gave out a loud sudden sneeze that semmed to have echoed the court around them.  
  
Both Mitsui and Miyagi slightly flinched at that. Both of them automatically lower down their faces, as Akagi suspecting that someone must be talking something about him behind his back searched for the culprits with a glower that could melt even the sun.  
  
"Uh oh", said Mitsui in response.  
  
Miyagi just grinned. "Anyway, point is Sakuragi is definitrly up to something. If he's doing something as stupid as scribbling...".  
  
Mitsui stopped him then with a look that warned him not to say anything about their captain behind his back or else he'll get a sneeze out of himself and would suspect them very much behind the cause of it later on, assuming that he'll even remember it.   
  
He caugtht himself before he said anything else at that and Miyagi said with a grin and a shrug. "You get the idea".  
  
"Oh, yeah", said Mitsui.  
  
"Question is.."  
  
"What is it?".  
  
###  
  
On the stands...  
  
"OHHH...", said all the four gundams suddenly, out of the blue.  
  
Surprised, Haruko said with concern.   
  
"Nanika? Is something wrong?", she asked.  
  
All 4 pair of gundam eyes lay fixed on the game before them and without turning their heads at her, they said simultaneously not really answering her question.  
  
"Nande monai (it's nothing)".  
  
But all four of had wide grins on their faces and Haruko thought that there was more than met the eye...  
  
Apparently something was going to happen on court and Haruko hadn't got any idea what it was.  
  
###  
  
"Something snell's fishy", murmured Kyota as the game progressed into action, with all thge players on court including himself trying his best to either guard, snatch or pass the ball around.  
  
Sendoh who looked like he was having a fun time running around in circles around the fuming and irritated Fukatsu finally made a beautiful back handed pass to Kyota, who at that second forget his earlier thoughts about two certain people and made a run for it with the orange ball bouncing wildly and skilfully under his monkey hand.   
  
"You're not going to run away from me that easily, my good friend", said Kyota's guard who out of nowhere easily appeared in front of him, making Kyota screeh to a breaking halt.   
  
"DAMN IT!", said Kyota more irritated than ever of feeling the constant feeling of being trapped in a corner more so than not in the game. Feeling he had enough of his own irritated and stressed emotions, he plunged into intsinct mode thouroughly letting his body do the work and make its own solution of how to get out of this current wall of a problem.  
  
Zoning on his instincts, he opt for his right blasting a powerful pass to the heavy weight Gorilla who was ready and open for any passes to him.  
  
With fists the size terrodector wing, the Gorilla turned dino bird caught the zooming flash of orange in his hands and wihtout wasting time yelled for a fast break. But the big grey and hairy King Kong of Akita was too fast for him and managed to snatch away the ball from Gori's grip like taking candy from a baby.  
  
Of course, this didn't make Akagi very happy making the reowned Gori of Shohoku/Kanagawa super mad and tried to snatch the ball away from his fierce primate rival. But neither gave in to let the other take the ball away from the other.  
  
The referee saw this and was about to blow the whistle when a blinding flash of orange and black light zoomed passed them, and both gori and king kong found themselves instead of gripping like their lives depended on it on the ball they were gripping the other's hands and arms instead as if they were ready to dance the tango with each other.  
  
Sendoh who was one of the only people in the hall to have seen and know who the black and red flashes were just chuckled at the dubious expression on most of the players on court had on. Knowing that this was the part where he was suppose to play in without them telling, Sendoh yelled for Kyota who were similiarly a bit dazed but still on battle mode.  
  
"Kyota, let's buy them sometime! Cover number 15! I'll cover yours and my friend over here", said Sendoh refering the last one as being Fukatsu.  
  
Kyota who wasn't sure who 'them' were, but knew that it was 'them' hew was refering too immediately without further adeu ran to cover the tall tree trunk of player, King Kong's little brother.  
  
But the 'little' brother of King Kong didn't see Kyota as an obstacle compared to Sakuragi and just bulldozed himover in seconds.  
  
Running rampage and on the loose, the younger king kong bounded his way towards the blurry figures of black, grey and red in front of him.  
  
Meanwhile, the black, grey and red blurry figures, being Rukawa, Sawakita and Sakuragi were besting each other in who was going to reach the other side of the court and onto the goal post first like a 100m race, with Sakuragi in the lead, Rukawa second with the ball bouncing crazily fast in one hand and Sawakita bringing up the rear.  
  
However, Sawakita was no lackey and in no time, he was neck to neck with Rukawa, his intention obviously and tried his best to snatch the fast bouncing ball away from Rukawa's masterful hand but Rukawa was too smart for him and in fact managed to keep the ball all the way.  
  
Sakuragi who didn't seem to give a damn about the two players who were hot on his tail suddenly turned to glance around his back, seeing pass kitsune and baldie and spotted a bulky figure rolling its way towards them.  
  
" GIANT BULLDOZER ON THE LOOSE!", yelled Kyota in warning as he tried to catch up with the mighty 'little' baby king kong no doubt trying to wrestle the big chunk of blubber to the ground, but being only a small monkey he knew he could only find himself sitting on the big guy's shoulder like a new breed type of hairy primate look alike parrot.   
  
Despite knowing that the big guy was after them, all three of them didn't seem to have taken notice.  
  
Then as if he had teleported out of nowhere or something, Sakuragi who had been on the lead and in front of them earlier seemed to have vanished into thin air.  
  
Sawakita who was surprised and taken aback at this, forget momentarily to snatch the ball still in Rukawa's possession and tried to figure out where Sakuragi was.   
  
Sakuragi was at the other end of the court, near the basketball goal post without as much as a hard breathe and grinning and waving a mock salute to him.  
  
Not wanting to wonder too much how the hell the kid got there like the distance was nothing to him, Sawakita turned his attention back to his arch rival.  
  
And he almost tripped over his own feet when he realised that he was staring at his back!  
  
Cursing himself for his carelessness, Sawakita made up his mistake by increasing his speed and matched up with Rukawa easily.  
  
Sawakita saw the opening then.. right ...  
  
'There!'.  
  
Quick as lightening, Sawakita reached over and...  
  
"KITSUNE! NOW!", roared Sakuragi, waving at his teammate the kitsune like a headless chicken.  
  
Without warning, Rukawa sreeched to a halt, letting Sawakita grasp thin air in front of him, tripped over on his own feet and landed on his butt.  
  
Rukawa was now readying himself for a jump shot, arms high up in the air, ball ready to be catapulated... but Sawakita was having none of that.   
  
Scrambling to his two feet, Sawakita was about to jump up when a big shadow fell on him.  
  
Then realising too late, the shadow became bigger and bigger and was heading straight towards them!  
  
Sakuragi cringed as a loud earth shaking BOOM! echoed around the indoor stadium as three bodies slammed onto the ground but not before the ball made its grand entrance through the net with a satisfying 'swish'.  
  
The score board clicked changing the score by 90 (Kanagawa) and 114 (Akita).  
  
But nobody except for a certain red head, raven haired and white haired noticed this. Everyone else was too shocked by the bodies that were sprawled out on court.  
  
Snapping out from his own shock, the referee whistled for a time out and called for the paramedics who were on stand by.  
  
Sakuragi snickered as he jogged over the sprawled bodies. One of them being a pissed and half flattened kitsune.  
  
However, flattened he was, Rukawa didn't show so much as a cringe of pain or even some sort of injury on his lean mean machine of a body. What did display itself was the murderous intention in his eyes, at a certain red head idiot who had a fun time seeing his kitsune friend trampled to death.  
  
After assuring some of the players and referees that he was alright and didn't need anyone to check if he was okay and if he did really survive and not a mere illusion of the ghost of Rukawa, Rukawa calmly went to Sakuragi who was having a hard time not to laugh at Sawakita's bloody damaged nose and brusied shoulder as well as a dazed but physically fine baby king kong.  
  
Grabbing by the scruff of his uniform, Rukawa dragged a protesting Sakuragi to one side.  
  
"Do'aho! Exactly what the hell are you LAUGHING at? I almost got trampled over like a pan cake, yarou!", said Rukawa in a dangerous Rukawa growl that could come close to a yell.  
  
Sakuragi who was unfazed just chuckled more and more until he went down landing on his kness, tears of mirth pouring out of his eyes.  
  
Knowing that he wouldn't get anything from him in his current helpless state, Rukawa kicked him hard on the butt just to get rid of his rising anger and extreme annoyance.  
  
Rukawa's kick only made Sakuraigi laugh even harder.   
  
While the referees and paramedics fussed over a bloody nosed Sawakita, who looked like he wanted to shout bloody hell at Sakuragi, and a still dazed but otherwise physically fine Mikio, Rukawa assessed thge situation and noted the current time left and current score.  
  
"Damn", cursed Rukawa under his breathe at the scoreboard on the other side of the court. They needed the time that they haven't got if they wanted to win this game. 21 difference in score is too much for only 2 minutes. Shit!  
  
At least for the moment he earned, a couple of free throws.   
  
When the fuse was finally over between the paramedics, referees and the other 2 Akita players, the referee blew the whistle signalling Rukawa was to have his two free shots under intentional foul by Mikio.  
  
Meanwhile what was our other red haired hero thinking?....  
  
Despite his earlier maniacal and free leash of laughter, Sakuragi sobered and in fact there was no trace of that same laughter in his eyes or his face for that matter. All that was left was a serious expression, so serious that anyone and everyone who was a fan of Sakuragi in that stadium wondered if this was Sakuragi at all. Even the gundam, his other teammates and coaches on the bench noted this slight but noticeble expression. They were left wondering what the red head was thinking if he was thinking at all.  
  
In fact, Sakuragi was thinking deeply about the situation their team was messed in. While everyone was focused on the throws that Rukawa was making, Sakuragi was fast making a desicion as a plan began to formulate in his mind.  
  
Sakuragi remembered something that his sensei would say time and again to him. However, he never thought anything of it. In fact, everytime his sensei says that to him he'd immediately bristle and pointed out that there's nowhere in hell that was going to happen.   
  
This time, however, as usual, his respected Anzai sensei was right. If he wanted the team to win gloriously over the arrogant Akitas he'd have to swallow his pride.  
  
And acknowledge another player's skills that matches his own.  
  
Well, almost like the master tensai basket-man Sakuragi anyway, allowed Sakuragi grudgingly.  
  
"Ah shit", growled Rukawa and Sakuragi simultaneously under their breathes, just as the raven head scored another 2 points (from the free throws) for the Kanagawas and just as both players reached to the same conclusion.  
  
Which was the ULTIMATE solution.  
  
The referee blew the whistle then signalling for the players to go to their positions.   
  
As if on cue, liquid lava eyes met cool sapphire eyes.  
  
One black eyebrow slightly raised.  
  
The tensai slightly grinned in reply.  
  
It's time to get serious.  
  
And it was also time to get in sync.  
  
Somewhere on the Kanagawa bench, someone continued to slurp his tea peacefully amid the tense atmosphere.  
  
But a slight smile was etched on his face.  
  
'It took them this long', he commented under his breathe, his comment gone unnoticed by the people that surrounded him.   
  
Except for us, no?  
  
ALL RIGHT! Sori for the late update and the forever dragging way I tell this story.  
  
Watch out for the next chapter 11.  
  
Later days, dear readers. 


	11. 11: Two storms in one nation The Ultima...

Disclaimers: Slam Dunk belongs to Takehiko Inoue sensei. I, on the other hand, own nothing except for this fanfic and the star combi's my idea;  
  
A/N: This is NON-YAOI. Story takes place after Shohoku's match against Sannoh. Their match against Sannoh can be found in the last six volumes of SD.  
  
Btw, warning: language (ok maybe not serious but yeah know, just in case)   
  
On with the next chapter!!!!   
  
11: Two storms in one nation ; The Ultimate weapon!  
  
It was without a saying that the Akitas were a tough lot, thought one of the referees who refereed the game as he and the rest of the other two referees tried to persuade Sawakita Eiji, who still supported a bloody nose which was now wrapped up nicely so that his nose looks twice larger than normal in a couple of plasters and bandages, from playing any further in the game. After all, it's his nose that's injured. How in heck can you breathe when you're nostrils were practically closed up? However, sawakita had other plans and simply refused to sit on the bench and insisted that he was fine and can breathe as normally as anybody else.  
  
Reluctantly, the referees finally let Sawakita have his own way and with that the referee blew the whistle signalling everyone to take their positions for the start of the last minute game.  
  
Sawakita watched his fellow teammate, Fukatsu, the point guard of their team, pass the ball to a fellow teammate. He then glanced at the scoreboard. He grinned inwardly. Nice, he thought smugly, feeling some of his stressed tension leaving his body. With under 3 minutes, almost to two there's was no way the Kanagawas could save themselves now. Besides the score difference was too huge. He supposed that he should have taken the referees advice to make himself scarse and comfortable at the side bench but as the number one high school basketball player, he had to be in every step of the way of the game. So there was no way he'd be sitting on the bench and miss all the action especially one that he'd star in.   
  
Besides, there's that small matter that red head freak and black haired arrogant kid needed some spanking for their arrogant attitude and a payback especially for the latter for the last game of his team's, Sannoh, defeat against their, team, Shohoku.  
  
Then....  
  
The corner of his eyes caught something. A flash of... Holy Shit!  
  
Sawakita was about to shout a warning and already on the run but he was too late!  
  
Fukatsu who was now in possesion of the ball was left blinking in confusion as the ball which was there in his hands a second ago supported only thin cool air. He missed the black blur that zoomed passed him.  
  
"FALLBACK! FALLBACK! Rukawa's got it!", shouted Sawakita to his teammates as he and the others dashed under full speed at the other side of the court.  
  
Ignoring the pain searing its way to his nose and the bandage that almost suffocated him in the running process, Sawakita managed to get almost side to side with Rukawa. Both of them looked like a passing blur, so fast they were running.  
  
Both of them were getting closer and closer to the net which was not to Sawakita's liking. He calculated the distance between himself and his arch rival, counting the time to steal the ball from him and the right time. Eyes focused on the ball. They were now almost entering the free throw line zone.   
  
3,2,1..  
  
Now!  
  
Sawakita made a lunge forward for the orange blur under Rukawa's masterful dribbling. YES! His palm got the ball....   
  
What the...  
  
Rukawa anticipating the move from Sawakita let him so far as touching the ball before in a split second, he made a wide 360 spin, ball in his hand and dribbled around a surprised Sawakita and dashed of the opposite direction.   
  
sawakita screeched to a halt and just in time to save himself from yet again flattening his nose against the ground with another fall. Twirling on one heel, Sawakita turned to chase after Rukawa but he was too late. Rukawa, who knew by this time how the mighty Sawakita play his game, knew that Sawakita himself knew how he played the game which was the reason why this next move was unexpected.  
  
As if it was the most natural move in the world, Rukawa passed the ball to the tall power forward of the Kanagawas and equally as if a river flows through a waterfall, he smoothly made a clean 3 pointer shot through the hoop.   
  
By this time, the audience were used to the red head's unpredictable shots and they didn't bother to get shocked. But their amazement still remained.  
  
However, the red head still managed to shock the rest of the people from the supporters of the Kanagawas.  
  
And they get even more shocked by the minute.  
  
After the 3 pointer shot, earning the Kanagawas with 93 to 114 Akitas, Fukatsu passed the ball to Sawakita who had no intention of letting the ball slip out of his grasp to anyone else's raced to the other side of the court.  
  
Suddenly out of nowhere, a wall appeared in front of him. Two solidly built, red uniformed walls with two contrasting but sharp dangerous eyes staring back at him.  
  
Startled like hell, Sawakita managed to screech to a halt but not in time as he slammed on them like a ton of bricks but before he could push his way through them, he found himself falling forward through the open space, walls that was there a second ago vanished just like that into thin air.  
  
Feeling the fine hairs at the back of his neck raising, he knew that both of them were already on the other side of the court.  
  
Just as he turned around, he saw Rukawa running like the speed of light towards the net while Sakuragi was way behind him, surrounded by Fukatsu, Mikio and Kawata. They were menacingly bearing down on him daring him to run any further or make a shot.   
  
Sakuargi did run but not any further. Fukatsu was enclosing him from in front. Mikio and Kawata were blocking his escape route around his back.  
  
Then Sakuragi did something that in the history of the Kanagawas have never seen before.  
  
As Fukatsu was closing in around him up front, Sakuragi jumped and swung his arm in an arm and threw the ball like a disc into the air zooming towards the board.   
  
At first it would look like Sakuragi was attempting a desperate try at a jumpshot but it wasn't.  
  
Sawakita foresaw this as well as the other power forward from the Akitas. They made a mad dash for the hoop. Sawakita was faster but he was too late.   
  
The ball was way too off the side of the ring, no way was it going to hit the ring.   
  
And then...  
  
Every player on the side bench of the Kanagawas and the Akitas, all the coaches including a certain white haired coach automatically stood up unconciously in anticipation when...  
  
A long arm suddenly appeared behind the orange ball, supported by a sure hand and a body that could only belong to...  
  
"RUKAWA! HIT IT!", yelled Sakuragi already grinning all the way.   
  
As if that was all he needed, Rukawa swung his arm, caught the ball in one hand and made a powerful dunk through the hoop.   
  
The ball whoosed through the net like a beautiful dream.  
  
That dunk wasn't the only thing that made the whoosed and amazed silence that waved through audience in the stadium.   
  
The alley-oop which was perfectly executed were too great to describe.  
  
A storm was finally brewing.  
  
And it sure as hell was about time.  
  
Every jaws of the Kanagawa supporters except for a chuckling old man unhinged themselves to the ground with no time to get it back to its proper place as the storm continued to brew dangerously.  
  
"Nice pass", Rukawa allowed himself to say.   
  
Sakuragi grinned."Nice dunk", he returned.  
  
Rukawa just raised an eyebrow slightly at that but Sakuragi only continued to grin.  
  
When they were back into their positions, Rukawa noticed the subtle change in plans of the Akitas.   
  
"A'ho", called Rukawa before the Akitas dispersed and got back to their positions.   
  
Sakuragi raised his eyebrows questioningly at him.  
  
"They're going to use Kawata this time so...", said Rukawa but Sakuragi was one step ahead of him.   
  
With a grin, he said, "ah, wakataroyou. It'll be peachy".  
  
Rukawa's only reply to that was an upward arch to his eyebrow.  
  
"Oi, Kitsune. While they're still planning I have an idea".  
  
This time the arch went two notches higher.   
  
Annoyed at his reaction, Sakuragi for once however decided to ignore it. "Here's the plan....".  
  
###  
  
Sakuragi was now guarding Kawata to the annoyance of Akagi but the tensai didn't have time for the Gori's tantrums now. He still had time to race against and he had to have all his concentration focused on the game if he wanted to taste the sweet glory of winning.However, he still had to figure out how to steal that damn ball out of the king kong's grip.  
  
Sakuragi then saw Sendoh on his side. He looked like he was gaurding Fukatsu with his lfe but he also seemed to be having fun with it. He also seemed to know what Sakuragi was about to do because he was grinning and gave hima slight nod and a wink.  
  
Sakuragi who had no idea what that meant almost let Kawata pass through him or so he thought but Kawata managed to go to his side therefore breaking his barrier and passing through him when Sendoh slide pass Kawata, smoothly slipping the ball from Kawata's grip and passed it subtly to Sakuragi. Surprised but undeterred, Sakuragi grinned his thanks to Sendoh who saluted him in a ' your welcome'gesture before he zoomed off in a blur to the other side of the court.  
  
Realizing that the ball was not in his hands anymore, Kawata yelled for a fast break and they chased down on Sakuragi.  
  
Seeing that Rukawa was nowhere near the hoop, the Akitas knew that the red head was not going to pass it to the raven head and make another one of those stunts like the alley-oop.  
  
However, seeing that their teammate was in trouble, the Kanagawas, who were caught up in the rythem and the heat of the action, came to his aid.  
  
Kyota made his way through the maze of moving bodies and made his way to Sakuragi. Catching his eye, Sakuragi subtly passed the ball at Kyota who slipped smoothly through the players with the ball almost noiselessly bouncing off the ground from under his hand.  
  
When the Akitas realized almost too late of the trickery, Kyota was already making his way to make a jump shot but Kawata who was the king of rebounds for the Akitas refused to let a puny punk cross his territory and let in an easy shot. With a powerful swipe and a powerful roar that shook the board behind him, the ball zoomed away from kyotas hand and landed to the ground. The impact made it bounce so high that even through the forest of hands trying to lunge for it, only the highest one caught it.   
  
Master of jumps next only to both Sakuragi and Rukawa, Akagi jumped so high his hand went higher than the ball and he caught it in his Gori hands.   
  
Knowing that if he landed on the ground with the ball, sneaky players from the opposing team would take that chance to snatch the ball away from him. Rasing his arms high, he turned his body around and passed it to the person he knew would finish the job.  
  
Rukawa was at the ready, and caught the ball in his hands. Not a second passed that he caught the ball he immediately, jumped and made a high arch for an attempted shot.   
  
"In your face, kid!", yelled Sawakita who suddenly sprung out of nowhere in front of blocking his shot.  
  
Seeing the enthusiatic effort made by his guard, Rukawa knew that he'd done it.   
  
A slight curve found itself to the ends of his lips as Sawakita for the second or so time, accidentally tapped his outstetched arm.  
  
Sawakita's eyes widened at the realization and remembrance.  
  
Rukawa made the shot.  
  
"Shit!", yelled Sawakita as the ball made its way to the hoop.  
  
"In your face", Rukawa returned with the slightest of smirk at a pissed Sawakita as the ball went through the hoop earning yet another 3 points for the Kanagawas.  
  
Sakuragi who witnessed the exchange, later asked him after Rukawa made the one free throw earning the Kanagawas with score 99 Kanagawas to 114 Akitas.   
  
Rukawa just shrugged and made no comment.  
  
Dissatisfied but letting that pass, Sakuragi noted the score and the time. Score difference now was 15 points with the Akitas still in the lead but the flow of the game was in their favour now. However, the Akitas were tough adversaries, very tough indeed. There's no telling when their favour will hold. Especially since the odds were against them since time was still not on their side.  
  
Sakuragi's idea was to get the akitas make as much fouls as possible, the ones that would benefit the Kanagawas especially if they get free throws. However, that idea would last because the Akitas might get onto us. Espcially since Sawakita was laready tricked into doing it twice. Unless the baldie was being careless they could pull another stunt like that again on him but he did not think that would work again on the top recognized player.  
  
"Oi, Gori!", called out Sakuragi to Akagi, jogging his to him.   
  
The so called Gori looked inquiringly him and Sakuragi asked him if he had any plans, anything at all to defeat the Akitas for the last 2 minutes.  
  
Akagi frowned and said a he drew a blank. His mind's too much on pounding the other primate, Kawata, to pieces anyway to think of anything much of else.  
  
Sakuragi knew that the wild monkey would be of no help at all and so consulted Sendoh instead.  
  
Sendoh wasn't much of a help either. But unlike Akagi he did adviced Sakuragi on one thing.  
  
"Sakuragi, relax will you? And try to have fun ion this game. Be happy, kiddos, like me (Sakuragi made a face at this). Because if you don't your mind as well as your body won't be happy either and they'll only make you even more stressed out and uncoordinated with your thinking and movements. Just enjoy the game, Sakuragi".  
  
Oh, make that 2 advices.... or not.  
  
"By the way, Sakuragi", said Sendoh with his sunny grin and thumbs up. "We'll win this one, kiddo. You know why?".  
  
Sakuragi shook his head.  
  
Sendoh's grin never let up.   
  
"2 reasons".  
  
Sakuragi waited for Sendoh to explain but it was obvious that the spiky haired player had no intention of elaborating any more than he had just said.   
  
Just as the whistle blew, sakuragi called out. "Sendoh! What are the 2 reasons?".  
  
Again Sendoh made no move to answer his reply except for his infuririating sunny grin.  
  
A bit pissed by Sendoh, Sakuragi went to his positon still mulling over what those two reasons could be.  
  
Rukawa who had witnessed the exchange asked him what that was all about. Sakuragi explained briefly and then asked Rukawa if he knew what Sendoh was talking about.  
  
Rukawa's only reply was a thoughtful frown and a thoughtful silence.  
  
Assuming that the kitsune also didn't have any idea what Sendoh was talking about proceeded to forget what Sendoh had just said. However, Rukawa did understand what Sendoh was talking about and knew what the two reasons were or at least he suspected he knew what they were but there was no way in hell he'd tell the red head idiot what the 2 reasons were. One of the reasons sure but the other, you have got to be kidding. And yet, what Sendoh had said was true. He wasn't going to admit it outloud though.  
  
The last one minute went in a blur, with the Kanagawas scoring 7 more shots, some by the help of throw ins and 3 pointers, but the Akitas also scored 2 other points.  
  
The current score now was 106 Kanagawas to 116 Akitas.  
  
"Shit. We're still behind them by ten points", said Sakuragi under his breathe, glaring at the scoreboard as if it was the scoreboard's fault that they were not going anywhere near the opponents score.  
  
A hand found its way to slap on Sakuragi's head at the same time a voice said, "Oi, a'ho. Don't get distracted. we need a plan".  
  
Turning his gaze to glare instead at Rukawa, Sakuragi growled. "Though I am a tensai, I admit. I'm drawing a blank on a possible plan. The damn one minute timing is damn killing my way of thinking", Sakuragi excused himself.  
  
Rukawa gave the slightest roll of his eyes and a puff of slight sigh of exasperation but did not comment but he did frown however.  
  
The other three players came over.  
  
"Damn. How in hell are we going to get through this if don't have a solid plan in our hands?", demanded an agitated Kyota, eyes flashing.  
  
"Calm down, Kyota. Things'll turn be ok", said Sendoh easily, as if they were not about to lose the game and that they had all the time in the world.  
  
Akagi who was growing a pounding tick on his temple at Sendoh's and Kyota's continous banter slammed their heads on one another, ignoring their yelps of pain and calmly said,"Even though we don't have a solid plan in our hands, we still have to keep up with 5 things. Rebound, score, speed, offense and defense. especially the first two. We can't afford to let the akitas get in another score or else we're as good as gone. Got that?".  
  
Everyone acknowledged him this.  
  
"Good. Ok, here's the deal. Sendoh, Kyota and myself, we'll be doing the defense so that leaves you too on the heavy offense. agreed?".  
  
A few seconds later, all of them agreed.  
  
Before getting back to their positions, Akagi reminded them.  
  
"You two. we'll be depending on you now so no funny stuff. Work as a team", said Akagi half in encouragement and half in warning.  
  
Both Sakuragi and Rukawa did not respond to that.  
  
###  
  
One in minute on the clock.  
  
Ready? Set...  
  
GO!  
  
They were off!  
  
Fukatsu was now in possesion of the ball. Sendoh in front of him, grinning his face off. What the hell was he doing? Talking in the game to his opponent? But never mind that. The stone faced Fukatsu was ignoring the hell out of the crap the hedgehog haired player was spewing and only has eyes focused on the situation ahead of him.  
  
Eyes glanced on the left then on the right. Huh. His teammates the powerfoward and small forward were on either sides of him ready to spring into action on the slightest of signals from their leader. An opening... where the hell was it?  
  
There! The right one too.   
  
Fukatsu slipped through the break of Sendoh's barrier and was about to pass it to Sawakita when a he found himself facing face to face with a grining cheeky Sendoh.  
  
"Yoh! Predictable aren't you?", said Sendoh before he slapped the ball from Fukatsu and made a grab of it and dashed his way to the other side of the court yelling fast break to the rest of his team.  
  
Damnation! How the hell did all the akitas save for Fukatsu got there so fast? Dammit! But never mind. Minor setback. The Kanagawas can do this. How much time do they have left? Huh! Can't get distracted now. Screw the scoreboard and the time. They can do this.   
  
Sendoh quickly scanned his surroundings. Eyes intent on his left. His guard, the powerforward of the other team fell for it while the ball bounced its way to the clutches of Rukawa.  
  
Upon receiving the ball, the raven haired player wasted no time. He made a dash for the 3 pointer shot zone but the hell! Sawakita was sticking to him like glue and his barrier refused to be penetrated.   
  
Gori came to rescue. He barrelled his way through, leaving his charge, the other primate behind, to get to Rukawa. Rukawa saw him, gave him the slightest of nods before he slipped to the other side. Sawakita could have blocked him but Akagi had just in time slipped himself through between him and Rukawa effectively blocking him from getting at Rukawa.  
  
Rukawa was already in mid air, behind the 3 pointer shot line executing his shot. But damn a busy body just made its way through and blocked his view! It was Kawata! But the ball was already too high the air so at least the king kong beast could make a swipe of it but it was enough to make Rukawa's shot imbalanced.  
  
"Shit", muttered Rukawa under his breathe. But that was no problem. They still had another player that would kill to get that shot through.  
  
And he was right. The king of rebounds, tensai Sakuragi Hanamichi was already at the ready at the board. No one from the akitas were guarding him. This slight mistake was only noticed by the akitas too late as the red head jumped for the ball that bounced off the ring and made a resounding dunk through the hoop.   
  
The crowd went wild at this.  
  
2 more points for the Kanagawas. But there was no time for a quick celebration just as yet. The Kanagwas were still behind by 8 points and the clock was ticking.  
  
Ball was still out of the line, Mikio had the ball and was the one about to pass it to his big bro, Kawata when Rukawa made the slightest incline of his head signalling a plan to Sakuragi who understood. Mikio passed it to Kawata but he was just too careless. He didn't see the panther slinking through him and the king kong and effectively stealing the ball away from their possession.   
  
Sawakita who saw this mistake yelled a curse and prepared to jump in order to block Rukawa's attempted goal under the basket shot. Sapphire blue eyes cut through Sawakita's grey ones as the ball went right over to the other side of the court! Hell no, 3 pointer shot! Shit!  
  
Sakuragi was there to receive it with no one guarding him. he was as free as a cageless bird. Oh, yeah. He got it and made the shot! Whoosh in the ball goes!  
  
"Woo hoo!", yelled Miyagi in the sidelines jumping from his seat the minute the ball went through the net.  
  
"Alright! Not bad, Sakuragi. NOT BAD!", yelled Mitsui who himself had also jumped out of his seat.  
  
"NICE ONE SAKURAGI-SAN! RUKAWA-SAN!", yelled Hikoichi who was jumping up and down in his excitement.  
  
"KANAGAWA, KANAGAWA, KANAGAWA!", shouted the rest of the teammates.  
  
"Nice pass", said Sakuragi to the kitsune.  
  
One slightly raised eyebrow.  
  
"Nice shot", allowed Rukawa in return.  
  
Sakuragi grinned and gave him a thumbs up. "Let's make four".  
  
Eyebrow raised another notch. "Your turn?".  
  
Sakuragi nodded and held up to fingers. "2 points. Baby kong over there".  
  
Rukawa looked over at Mikio who indeed looked like the Akitas wanted to use for their next move despite the earlier slip up.  
  
"Don't slip up", warned Rukawa.  
  
"Ceh. You've got to be kidding me. Back me up".  
  
"I'm on it".  
  
###  
  
Seconds later...  
  
Mikio went down like a rock and he was charged with intentional foul. This was his fifth foul and the big guy was out of the game.  
  
However, Sakuragi managed to get in 2 points before being too badly damaged by the giant player from the forced intentional foul that the red head somehow made him do.  
  
2 free throws for Sakuragi didn't go to waste.  
  
"Nice", commented Sendoh with his usual sendoh grin. "One bullie down. 4 others to go".  
  
Sakuragi grinned at that.  
  
"We're still behind and clock's screaming", reminded Kyota, stressed out.  
  
"Chill out, kiddo. We've got it covered", said Sendoh. "We'll still stick to Akagi's plan".  
  
"What do you mean 'we've' got it covered? We're still behind by...", said Kyota but was interrupted by Akagi.  
  
"By 4 points", said Akagi. "Screw the time. We can do this. Like Sendoh said stick to the plan. You two, offense. We'll do the defense".  
  
"Right", agreed all of them simulataneously.  
  
"Then, let's move out".  
  
###  
  
Sawakita noted the time. They had about 39 seconds left on the clock and they were in the lead by 4 points.  
  
Ah, shit. How in hell did they catch up to them that fast?  
  
"Sawakita over here", said Fukatsu motioning for sawakita to come over to him and the rest of the akita players.  
  
"The Kanagawas are onto us. The lead and the time is on our side but we can't afford to let any careless mistakes this time or else they'll gain the advantage", Fukatsu was saying as all of them quickly discussed of how to stay on the lead and win the game.  
  
Then Sawakita spoke up. "They're using Rukawa and that red head kid as their offense".  
  
Fukatsu nodded. "That's where you and Kawata come in. Kawata guards the taller guy, the red head and you guard Rukawa".  
  
"What about that guy, Akagi?", said Kawata.  
  
"Don't worry the rest of us will cover the others", assured Fukatsu, "Whatever you do though don't lessened your guard. They're both unpredictable".  
  
"Any questions?", said Fukatsu.  
  
When no one said anything, Fukatsu nodded and said, "Then, let's move out".  
  
###  
  
It was a tense moment for everyone. With time nearly at the end of the game and still the two adversaries refusing to give in to the other no one knew who was going to emerge the victor in this game.   
  
Both Miyagi and Mitsui were bathed in their sweat, though not playing in the game, were as tense as hell. Maki, Jin, Uozumi, Fujima and the rest of the Kanagawa representatives either clenched their fists in anticipation or grinding their jaws shut like anything. Hikoichi, Ayako and Kogure however, were yelling their support at the tops of their lungs for their Kanagawa teammates on court. The gundam and Haruko and friends also weren't left behind in their cheers of support. While the coaches of the Kanagawas looked stressed out save for Anzai sensei who was still sipping his never ending herbal tea.  
  
The crowd of audience chanted both the team names. Shouting defense and the other offense.  
  
However, all the players on court didn't hear the defeaning noise all around them. All of their concentration were focused on the last 39 seconds of the game.  
  
The slightest mistake of either team would be fatal to both of them.  
  
Rukawa looked at Sakuragi. The red head caught the look.   
  
'Let's do this', said Rukawa's look.  
  
Sakuragi's slight grin said, 'You're on'.  
  
Fukatsu passed the ball to Sawakita then.  
  
Sawakita wasting no time whoosed passed Sendoh and Kyota's defense in zig zag pattern leaving behind Rukawa who was supposed to guard him.  
  
Akagi was ready for the top player. Arms outstretched like a tall wall, legs ready to spring in any direction be it up or at the sides to block Sawakita's shot.  
  
The second Sawakita made his jump in an attempted jumpshot, Akagi made a high jump too blocking his view and even tried to swipe the ball away from him but his and couldn't touch the ball.  
  
Holy shit! Sawakita's execution of the ball was too damn high! akagi couldn't reach it. Dammit, the shot was going to go through if no one can block it.  
  
Then...  
  
"Move aside Gori! Tensai baskeman Sakuragi to the rescue!", yelled sakuragi barelling his way through the players on top speed and in a split second his arm was already in mid air, his body suspended high in the air from his infamous powerful jump and caught the ball swiftly and easily in one hand.  
  
Open mouthed everyone watched as Sakuragi turned his body almost 360 in mid air, ball still in one hand and without a beat he yelled, "Rukawa!".  
  
Simultaneously, he threw the ball on full blast into the air making the ball look like an orange blur ready to be recieve at its receiving end.  
  
A split second later, Rukawa caught the orange ball and without so much as missing a beat he immediately launched his deadly 3 pointer.  
  
Needless to say the shot went in earning the Kanagawas another 3 points.  
  
The crowd in the stands and on court went wild with the shot made by Rukawa.  
  
The scoreboard now showed 115 Kanagawas to 116 Akitas.   
  
And the time was now the last 20 seconds.  
  
Rukawa's fisted his fist. One pint difference. Yes, they can do this.  
  
Sakuragi on the other hand was laughing his tensai laugh off.   
  
Kyota and Akagi ran to Sakuragi with Kyota giving him a headlock, yelling he was an idiot and Akagi pounding Sakuragi's back continously saying that it was a catch and pass.  
  
Fukatsu went over to Sawakita. "Cool down, Sawakita. We can still beat them".  
  
Through gritted teeth, Sawakita nodded. He was reminded of the time that they had lost against the Shohokus. It was almost exactly like their current situation. with them in the lead and yet the tide on the opponent's side with time constraining between them.  
  
"Kawata!", said sawakita jogging towards him.   
  
"Nanda?".  
  
"Back me up. I'll score the next shot".  
  
With one raised eyebrow but no comment, Kawata just nodded trusting the top player without question. Besides, he could see that sawakita was fired up and raging mad for a fight.  
  
Then, let the last 20 seconds of the game end.  
  
###  
  
"Rukawa!", yelled Sakuragi as he raced after the baldie, sawakita who was in possession of the ball.   
  
"Cis", said Rukawa under his breathe as he raced after Sawakita.  
  
"Get him!", yelled Sendoh to his teammates as Sawakita slipped pass him in a blur and entering the goal zone.  
  
Kyota matched Sawakita's step and attempted to steal the ball away from him but could only touch empty air. Kyota would've tripped and charged into Sawakita if it weren't for Akagi who was behind him and pulled him by the scruff of his neck and threw him to one side. However, Sawakita was still on the move and no one was guarding the goal area.  
  
Shitting hell, thought Akagi a bit too late.  
  
Sawakita made a high jump then and prepared to make what looked to be like a powerful slam dunk.  
  
But Sakuragi was having none of that.  
  
Seemingly coming out of nowhere the red head blocked Sawakita's dunk.   
  
Surprised but undetered Sawakita slapped his the ball away from Sakuragi's grip to his other hand and passed it to an awaitng Kawata below.   
  
Kawata received the ball easily and jumped to make te final shot.  
  
But Rukawa was having none of that.  
  
Appearing instantly in front of the king kong of the Akitas, his hand was about to steal the ball away from him when the ball went back to Sawakita.  
  
sawakita who had just landed on his feet with sakuragi still suspended in thin air, sawakita made another powerful jump, caught the ball and without anyone stopping him he made the slam dunk.  
  
BAM! In went the ball, earning 2 points for the Akitas.  
  
And the crowd went wild.  
  
Current score was now 115 Kanagawas to 118 Akitas.  
  
HOLY SHIT! 3 points behind. How the hell did that happen?!  
  
With 9 seconds behind, there's no way the Kanagawas could make it. But the Akitas were having none of that belief especially the Sannoh players. The Kanagawa were unpredictable and could turn the tide on them in a split scond like their last game against the shohoku. They were definitely not going to gamble their luck on their current lead and situation.  
  
The second the ball touched Sakuragi's hand, he roared, "Rukawa!".  
  
Anticipating the move, Kawata blocked sakuragi's view and refused to let Sakuragi pass the ball to anyone much less to the super rookie Rukawa.  
  
"Chikuso!", yelled Sakuragi in biting frustration seeing that the big ape blocked his view and way too much. how in hell was he going to ...  
  
Sendoh!  
  
Glancing to his left, where Kyota stood Sakuragi yelled, "Kyota!".  
  
Falling for it, Kawata lunged on his left and immediately Sakuragi threw the ball at Sendoh who ran off like a shot onto the other side of the court.  
  
Cursing one obsenity after another, Kawata was hot on Sendoh's tail.  
  
6 seconds left ...  
  
The powerforward and shooting guard of the Akitas blocked Sendoh's way but Sendoh was undetered. Without so much as looking at either of his sides, the sunny faced Kanagawa player made a pass to one of his sides straight at Kyota who was running like hell and now had the ball in his hand.   
  
But Kyota didn't get too far because both sawakita and Fukatsu had blocked his path. However, there was no stopping the wild monkey's attempt to penetrate through their defense.  
  
Kyota jumped to his left, both players followed suit then Kyota tried to make a pass at his right but Fukatsu was onto him.  
  
But the wild monkey was not giving up.  
  
4 seconds...  
  
There!  
  
Without hesitation whatsoever Kyota slammed the ball over their heads.  
  
And the ball went straight for Rukawa.   
  
Hell no!  
  
Where the hell did Kawata come from?!  
  
Kawata who had anticipated the move from Kyota caught the ball in his hand, a smile of triumph forming on his primate lips.  
  
"YES!", yelled Sawakita.  
  
"Shitting hell! Hell, no you're not!", said Rukawa stealing the ball swiftly away from Kawata's grip.  
  
Kawata was about to lunge forward and get the ball back when akagi block him.   
  
"You're getting no where near that ball!", roared Akagi in Kawata's face.  
  
2 seconds...  
  
"RUKAWA!", roared Sakuragi at the top of is lungs.   
  
The red head was was frantically waving his hands like mad at him. Sakuragi was long past ready and was already behind the 3 pointer shot line.   
  
"SAKURAGI!", yelled Rukawa at the top of his lungs as he pulled back his arm and threw the ball in a blur at him.   
  
"YOSH!", yelled sakuragi the second the ball was in his hands.  
  
"NO!", yelled Sawakita.  
  
sawakita, Fukatsu and Kawata made a hurried but powerful jump to block Sakuragi's 3 pointer shot.   
  
Then the unexpected happened.  
  
Sakuragi slipped and lost his balance when the three players charged bodily against him.  
  
But the ball had already been released from his grasp and executed into the air.  
  
Before the ball made its way downward towards the net, four bodies slammed towards the ground with an echoing and bone cruching BANG!.  
  
Silence reigned the stadium as at the fallen bodies of the players and the ball which was now leisurely rolling and rolling round and round the ring.  
  
Everyone held their breathes.  
  
"GET IN BALL!, GET THE HELL IN!", shouted the Kanagawa supporters.  
  
"FALL OUT! FALL OUT! FALL OUT!", screamed the Akita supporters.  
  
0 second...  
  
At the sound of the buzzer, the ball swished through the net.  
  
Every heads in the stadium turned to stare at the referee who would be the judge of the shot.   
  
Was it in? Or was it out?  
  
Stay tuned for the next chapter 12 in GAME CONCLUDED  
  
See you in later days, dear readers.  
  
Yuki signing off. 


	12. EPILOGUE: GAME CONCLUDED

Disclaimer: SD does not belong to me. 

NOTE: I apologise for my very late update. But is the last chapter to close for this fic. Hope you enjoy it.

written by meEksiNs aka shiyuchiyuki on 08thFeb2006

EPILOGUE: GAME CONCLUDED

A few years later

In a historical game of high school basketball that had happened a few years ago in the first ever Inter-Prefecture tournament, a certain porcupine haired teammate had once said to him, with his sunny trademark grin, "We'll win this one, kiddo. You know why?".

Sendoh then claimed that there were two reasons.

When it was obvious that said teammate had no intention of elaborating any further, Sakuragi had demanded the answer out of him but had only received the same infuriating grin as if he knew something that the tensai didn't.

It was not until a few years later that he now understood wholely what the two reasons were.

FLASHBACK

The whistle was blown and the referee had waved his arm in a half arc downwards.

The score was 118 to 118.

The shot was in.

It was a tie.

Needless to say, the crowd went wild. The people on the bench on the Kanagawa team, who had been frozen with shock earlier, had spontaneously jumped up and down yelling their cheer amidst their disbelief.

The cheer of the crowds and those who supported the Kanagawas grew ten times louder when the referee called for Sakuragi to step up and take a free throw for the foul that the three other players from the opponents side had made.

Sakuragi, after the referee had announced that his shot was in, had been left stunned but now as he took the ball with the slightest of tremor of his hands from the referee he chastised himself for not believing that he, tensai Sakuragi Hanamichi, would not have made the shot.

He stared at the ball in his hands for a few seconds as he thought this. 'Who the hell am I kidding?I almost missed the shot! SHIT!'.

And he had another free shot to make. If he screw this up, hell, he knew that his team wouldn't make it to a tie breaker game. They were too drained. The only players who were up to it were only him and Rukawa.

At the thought of his arch rival, he looked up and saw the black haired kitsune, arching an eyebrow slightly at him not in question but as if he was saying, 'what the hell are you waiting for?'.

Sakuragi was taken aback when said rival suddenly, tilted his head to the opponent's side and smirked slightly. With a raise of one fist, he jerked it down with a thumb sticking towards the ground.

Sakuragi grinned.

Whatever shit he was worrying over earlier, he was calm now. With his confidence restored, he dribbled once and made the shot.

The score was 119 (Kanagawa) to 118 (Akita Shoten).

Nearly everyone in the Kanagawa team had cried of this miraculouswin excluding a maniac grinning porcupine teammate, two bull headed fresh young talents and ofcourse, a white haired rather round coach who had only 'HOHOHO' -ed and sipped his herbal tea in satisfaction.

Later on in newspapers everywhere in Japan, the game was dupped to be a historical game one that bore 2 storms in one nation.

END OF FLASHBACK

A ball suddenly found its way to the back of his head, making Sakuragi Hanamichi, who had now officially earned the name 'Tensai Sakuragi Hanamichi' the King of Rebounds, yell and turn towards his attacker.

The black haired Kitsune, his attacker and esteemed arch rival and who like Sakuragi, had earned the name 'The MVP Kaede', just coolly grabbed the bouncing ball that had made it's way back to him and spun the ball lazily around on his index finger unaffected by the red head's glare.

"What were you thinking, do'aho?", said Rukawa, looking at him with a slight eyebrow rasied with only mild interest shown in his icy blue eyes.

A few years ago, this question and expression on a usually very stoic Rukawa would have shocked him and a lot of people but working with him as a teammate for three years now, the red head felt no such thing although it couldn't be said the same about their other previous high school teammates if they ever saw this exchange.

Sakuragi did not answer immediately as he studied his arch rival and now valued teammate. Rukawa and himself had been recruited shortly after the first inter-prefecture tournament by the Japan National Young Talents Basketball team. Side by side, they had worked together as a duo in the national team and had earned recognitions for their basketball talents and skills. They were known as the formidable duo aka the '2 storms'.

"A few years ago, Sendoh had once mentioned that they were two reasons why he believed Kanagawa team will win".

Sakuragi knew that the Kitsune understood what he was refering to, for he had raised his eyebrow a notch higher.

"I never knew what the two reasons were until now".

Rukawa just stared at him for a few seconds then smirked. "You've always been one to be slow in the uptake, do'aho".

"NANI!"

An orange blur zoomed towards his face but this time Sakuragi easily caught it with one hand before a sudden thought struck him.

"WAIT! You knew what the two reasons were!".

Rukawa raised an eyebrow at him but instead of answering he said, "3 years, a'ho. What have you learned from it?".

For the first time ever in Sakuragi Hanamichi's life, he had answered immediately and accurately.

With a grin and a hearty slap on the kitsune's back, he said.

"It takes two to win".

THE END

Author's Note: Hey, ppl! This is FINALLY the last chapter for my 'When enemies become friends' fic aka renamed 'It takes two to win'.

In case you were wondering, I am aware that there are a few loose ends e.g. the one where there was a sort of deal between Sakuragi and Rukawa. This deal is not significant to the fic, however, in case you were curious it was a deal so that if Sakuragi made the last winning three pointer shot (if he was going to do it) Rukawa had agreed to make Haruko (somehow) not get attached to him anymore and in return if Haruko stopped bothering Rukawa, Sakuragi himself will stop pestering Rukawa. Since Sakuragi did make the last shot, their agreements on both sides were fullfilled. However, Haruko was not going out with either of them. In the end, she just remained friends and close aquiantences with both of them.

I didn't know how to put it into the fic this explaination so I didn't bother doing it. Too troublesome and besides like I said it wasn't that significant.

Anyway, i hoped that you've enjoyed this fic and Thank you for reading it.


End file.
